Chewin' on DeWine

The more I read about the Senate immigration bill, and the defeated compromise which followed, the more ticked off I get.

Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions has a nice website, which includes the text of a couple of his Senate speeches on immigration and, specifically, the legislation the Senate Judiciary Committee introduced to tackle that problem. In addition to being so riddled with loopholes virtually any illegal immigrant would qualify for citizenship, Sessions points out that the Senate never even looked at the potential cost of such a measure. From his speech:

“With those important caveats, estimated outlays are about $2 billion for the first 5 years--2007-2011--and $12 billion for the first 10 years--2007-2016. The final figures will be bigger than those. Most of those costs are for Medicaid and Food Stamp programs.

“They say those are not the final figures. The final figures will be bigger. It didn't include the earned income tax credit.”

And:

“…They also do NOT include revenue losses and outlays for the Earned Income Tax Credit, which we will be getting from the Joint Tax Committee and which results largely from the conditional non-immigrant provisions. Those revenue losses and Earned Income Tax Credit outlays may be significant.

“I will talk about the average salary of most of the workers who are here illegally today and those workers who will be regularized, placed on permanent resident status, given a green card, and placed on a pathway to citizenship. As you look at those salaries, you will see that they fall in the classic earned income tax credit range.

“I have had occasion for some time to wrestle with the earned income tax credit. A lot of people oppose it entirely. You file your tax return, and if you don't owe any taxes and you have a lower income, you get a tax rebate from the Government. You don't pay taxes; they give you an average rebate. I submit that salaries for these workers are going to be pretty close to the average recipient of the earned income tax credit benefit. The average recipient gets $2,400 a year by way of a tax credit. Persons who are working here illegally today are not currently getting the earned income tax credit, but if we regularize them and make them permanent residents, they will. That will cost us a lot of money.”

And being me, I had to bring this to the attention of Sen. Mike DeWine, my senator and one of the members of the Senate Judiciary Committee responsible for bringing this turd before the Senate.

Sen. DeWine:

You've got to be kidding me...you have a personal Senate website with an issues tab and NO policy points on immigration? Are you hoping that if you ignore the entire matter, it will simply be forgotten while the Senate is out of session?

If you're in need of policy direction, may I suggest you proceed to the website and policy matters delineated by your fellow Senator, Jeff Sessions of Alabama. He cuts through the doubletalk, examines in detail the dreck on immigration YOU HELPED come out of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and admits the results of such legislation would be amnesty for most people here illegally and a spiraling bill for those people on the path to citizenship.

Now that you're (presumably) away from the Beltway, do you actually HEAR what your constituents are saying? Close the border...then we'll have frank and open discussion about what to do with the people already here.

The Rantmeister

Expecting a response from the Senator’s Email Responsomatic in 3…2…1…