Thread: CA: State favors path to legality for illegals

We need to push hard for enforcement in California!


FIELD POLL
State favors path to legality for illegals
Majority supports Bush proposals for immigration reform

Tyche Hendricks, Chronicle Staff Writer

Tuesday, April 10, 2007

More than four in five California voters support giving legal residence to illegal immigrants, according to a statewide public opinion poll to be released today.

By wide margins, the state's voters also favor creating a temporary worker program to allow future immigrants to enter legally, increasing the border patrol and imposing stiff penalties on employers who hire unauthorized immigrants, the Field Poll found.

Those proposals are elements of a plan outlined by President Bush in the border city of Yuma, Ariz., on Monday, as he revived his call for comprehensive immigration overhaul.

Some analysts doubt any such legislation out of Washington, D.C., will go that far, however, because they think Bush lacks the political clout to rally divided Republicans behind his proposals.

Couching his hope for legalization and an expanded temporary worker status in the context of a "tough on security" message, Bush made his pitch at a Border Patrol station in the desert, where a new fence and increased staffing and high-tech surveillance have helped reduce illegal crossings 68 percent over the past year.

California voters increasingly oppose a federal plan for 700 more miles of border fence -- with just 37 percent favoring it this year, down from 47 percent last April, the Field Poll found. And just 53 percent of those polled voiced support the current policy of federal agents rounding up, detaining and deporting illegal immigrants.

Support among California voters for legalizing undocumented immigrants rose to 83 percent from 75 percent last April, while 67 percent of respondents backed a guest worker plan, up from 60 percent a year ago.

"The public is very open to providing a path to citizenship and giving temporary workers some kind of legal status, rather than having to do it on the sly," said Field Poll director Mark DiCamillo. "The issue now is, can Congress and the president agree on a package?"

"It's important that we get a bill done," Bush said Monday. "We deserve a system that secures our borders, and honors our proud history as a nation of immigrants."

Bush's plan also would include a workplace enforcement system based on a tamper-proof identification card for legal foreign workers and a means of allowing at least some of the nation's estimated 12 million illegal immigrants to earn legal status by paying a fine and waiting in line behind other applicants for permanent residence.

A similar immigration reform bill won bipartisan support in the U.S. Senate last year but the House of Representatives passed a conflicting bill that focused solely on enforcement, including the 700-mile border wall, which is the only recent change signed into law.

Both houses of Congress have shifted from Republican to Democratic control since then, but there is disagreement within each party on immigration.

"I'm a little dubious Congress will do anything this year because there are too many conflicting voices, particularly in the Republican caucus," said UC Irvine political scientist Louis DiSipio. "Some of the staunchest anti-immigrant voices in the House are Californians, despite the fact that the California electorate is clearly more tolerant."

Nationally, the coalition supporting comprehensive immigration overhaul includes "a collection of odd bedfellows: business and labor, ethnic pressure groups and ideological libertarians," said Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies in Washington, D.C., which favors tightening restrictions.

For example, business groups favor a guest worker program to ensure a steady supply of cheap labor, but don't care about offering citizenship. Labor unions, by contrast, want to give undocumented workers already in the country a path to citizenship and will only support a future worker program if it includes wage guarantees, he said.

"The internal contradictions among supporters of this idea have made it very difficult to get anything done, which is fine by me," said Krikorian. "I'm very confident this isn't going to happen."

Angela Kelley, associate director of the National Immigration Forum, a Washington, D.C., group lobbying for a liberal immigration policy, was more optimistic, citing Senate majority leader Harry Reid's promise to set aside the last two weeks in May to debate immigration.

"I think they can do it, but they have to do it soon, before we get into the 'silly season' of the 2008 election," she said. "This is not an easy issue for either party to either embrace or walk away from."

Kelley said she was not surprised by the Field Poll's finding that California voters endorse a combination of tougher enforcement, a legal foreign worker plan and a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants already here.

"You guys are the most informed because you live and breathe this," she said of California, a state with an estimated 2.5 million illegal immigrants, where more than one in four residents is foreign-born.

The Field Poll's findings confirm that California is more moderate on immigration policy than much of the rest of the country. Karthick Ramakrishnan, a professor of political science at UC Riverside, said this is because the state leans Democratic and has a long history with immigration and a significant and growing Latino electorate.

Californians' sense that illegal immigration is an urgent problem has declined slightly compared to a similar survey last July, and residents of the Bay Area were the least concerned, the poll found.

The poll results were based on a random survey of 570 registered voters statewide, interviewed by telephone in English and Spanish, March 20-31. The margin of error was plus or minus 4.5 percentage points.

E-mail Tyche Hendricks at thendricks@sfchronicle.com.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.c ... P5NEA1.DTL

who were the polling? are there any Americans left in california?

Support among California voters for legalizing undocumented immigrants rose to 83 percent from 75 percent last April, while 67 percent of respondents backed a guest worker plan, up from 60 percent a year ago.

They must have extracted these figures from the Twilight Zone. Every legal citizen I know here in California, and that includes many Latinos, are strongly opposed to any form of legalization of illegals.

The poll results were based on a random survey of 570 registered voters statewide, interviewed by telephone in English and Spanish, March 20-31.

Why would a poll conducted with American voters need to be performed in Spanish?

This polls 'findings' are utterly ridiculous and manufactured. There is no way in the world that 4 out 5 Californians, that passed Prop 187 to crack down on illegals by 56% of the vote in the 90's now favor amnesty 4 out of 5.

Complete garbage!

W

Originally Posted by Lone_Patriot

who were the polling? are there any Americans left in california?

Not too many it seems Lone Patriot. The bad part is California's electoral power which they are increasing by moving the primaries up. I see them get angry though when I throw out some of the stats to them. Like the $420 mil in welfare benefits to illegals in LA Country alone. Big eyes and jaw drops to that one! They are here and they can be woken up.

More than four in five California voters support giving legal residence to illegal immigrants, according to a statewide public opinion poll to be released today.

I don't believe for a minute that they polled only voters/citizens!

That poll is a PUSH poll and is insulting to any intelligent person. If they are going to lie about it, at least make it SOMEWHAT believable! And 570 people polled, is not a legitimate poll and why are registered VOTERS having to take it in Spanish?? It's more likely that 4 out of 5 American citizens are AGAINST it!

If you read the comments section in the San Diego paper about 9 out of 10 are anti-illegal and that translate throughout the country in most all newspapers. The only way they could get that kind of number was to deliberatly poll Spanish speaking areas!

Originally Posted by gofer

That poll is a PUSH poll and is insulting to any intelligent person. If they are going to lie about it, at least make it SOMEWHAT believable! And 570 people polled, is not a legitimate poll and why are registered VOTERS having to take it in Spanish?? It's more likely that 4 out of 5 American citizens are AGAINST it!

It is called MANIPULATION! But this is what we're up against out here. W cited Prop 187 and he's exactly right. The voters overwhelmingly voted for it but through the "powers that be" out here it was taken to "court" and declared unconstitutional. They fight dirty (in my opinion) here which is why I said we need A LOT of pressure on this issue in this State. California pilots legislation and tries to set precedents (on many liberal agendas) to push to the rest of the Country. This is a well known fact. Many people even in the border enforcement arena think California is lost already. I can't accept that.....I won't accept that. And I won't stop fighting.

pure propaganda to make people think the majority wants these people to have amnesty. Stuff your poll! put to a vote in Calif. and then maybe I will believe it, depending on who is running the voteing booths! and counting the votes!