Jeff Johnson, CNSNews.com
Thursday, Oct. 19, 2002

Rep. Dick Gephardt, D-Mo., told a crowd of nearly a thousand people that he will introduce legislation Thursday so that "undocumented people in our country can earn legalization."

"But it will have a very hard time getting through the Congress if the Republican Party continues their majority in the Congress," Gephardt told the crowd, which responded by chanting "No more Bush!"

"If we want to get earned legalization passed, we need a new agenda in your House of Representatives," he continued. "We need a Democratic majority to get this up and get it done."

David Ray, spokesman for the Federation for American Immigration Reform, took issue with Gephardt's terminology.

"Using the euphemism 'undocumented immigrant' to describe an illegal alien is like calling a bank robbery an 'unauthorized withdrawal,'" he charged. "It's an absurd term that candy-coats the fact that these are people who knowingly and willingly violated our immigration laws and are now trying to change the rules of the game."

Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill., echoed Gephardt's warning that amnesty legislation would be difficult to pass with Republicans in control of the House.

"In America we should always understand one of the principles," he said. "And that is: He who has the most votes dictates the public policy of this country."

Ray criticized what he sees as Democrats' pandering to illegal aliens in hopes of gaining personal political power.

"The Democrats see the illegal alien population as the next group of likely voters and are courting them as such and are willing to extend citizenship and voting rights to this population," he argued, "because they know that they tend to be overwhelmingly poor and undereducated and are going to be more receptive to the message of large government and big social spending."

'Deadly Serious'

Gephardt assured the crowd that he is "deadly serious" about forcing the yet-to-be-introduced bill through Congress and sending it to the president.

"Let's test whether or not there are Republicans who really want to allow people to earn their legalization in this country," he charged. "Let us put them to the acid test; and that is to take these postcards down the street and turn them into legislation."

The Missouri Democrat referred to a reported one million postcard "petitions" collected by the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), an affiliate of the AFL-CIO. The cards are addressed to President Bush and members of Congress, and decry immigrations laws that "force" illegal aliens, "who work hard and pay taxes, to live in fear of being deported for simply going to work each day."

"First of all ... they are not getting deported. Only a small fraction are getting deported," Ray said of the estimated 8 to 11 million illegal immigrants currently residing in the U.S. "Secondly, they're not being deported for going to work; they're being deported for being a gate-crasher, for coming here illegally."

He noted that illegal immigrants bypass the required criminal background checks, health examinations and other immigration procedures designed to protect law-abiding U.S. citizens and guests in the country.

Gephardt specifically thanked "organized labor" for sponsoring the rally and the petition drive.

John Sweeney, president of the AFL-CIO, drew one of the strongest reactions during his address to the crowd, comprised of many people wearing T-shirts identifying them as union members.

"We renew our call not only for full workplace rights for all workers, regardless of their immigration status," Sweeney said, "and a meaningful program to bring immigrant workers into our national community through full citizenship."

Ray believes the unions are also pandering to the illegal immigrant population in the U.S.

"The unions have now announced a full-scale membership drive using illegal aliens as the chief component of membership building," he said. "The unions have been unsuccessful in recruiting American workers and people who are in this country legally, and so they are turning to the large illegal immigrant population."

Both the American economy and national security are at risk, according to Ray, if the U.S. does not curb illegal immigration.

"If we don't have border security, we're not going to have real protection from people who are serious about coming here and doing Americans and American workers real harm like what happened on September 11th," he explained. "Continued lax border enforcement is also going to lead to real economic problems for this country and this country's workers."

Ray stressed that he believes most illegal immigrants are not connected to terrorism in any way. He noted, though, that terrorists exploit the same laxities and loopholes in U.S. immigration laws as those whose only crime is living and working in the U.S. illegally.

Read more on this subject in related Hot Topics:

Immigration/Borders

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