Elections
6th CD's Republican candidates in lockstep on immigration
By Berny Morson, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)
Friday, August 8, 2008

Steve Ward

Ted Harvey

Mike Coffman

Wil Armstrong
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What is this?
Illegal immigration is a major issue in Colorado's 6th Congressional District, where outgoing Republican U.S. Rep. Tom Tancredo repeatedly has called for a crackdown.

Candidates for the Republican nomination to succeed Tancredo hold similar positions on the issue.

Businessman Wil Armstrong, Secretary of State Mike Coffman, state Sen. Ted Harvey, of Highlands Ranch, and state Sen. Steve Ward, of Littleton, agree the United States should:

* Distinguish between illegal immigrants and those who come to the U.S. through work programs. The legal workers are needed for jobs such as harvesting crops.

* Secure the border to reduce illegal crossings.

* Refuse to grant amnesty - much less citizenship - to the estimated 12 million immigrants who are in the U.S. illegally now, unless they return to their country of origin and apply to return legally.

The 6th CD includes Douglas and Elbert counties and parts of Arapahoe, Jefferson and Park counties. It has the lowest percentage of Hispanic residents - about 7 percent - of any Colorado congressional district, according to a 2006 U.S. Census Bureau estimate.

The data do not specify how many are immigrants.

Armstrong

"I'm a law-and-order guy, and I think that it's important that we don't reward illegal activity, and so I'm against amnesty in any form."

He would punish businesses that abet illegal immigration.

"I'm somebody who believes that if you live here, you need to speak English. . . . If you live in America and you don't know English, you're a second-class citizen, and I just don't think that America and Americans really rightly think that we should have second-class citizens or indentured servants here in America."

Coffman

Coffman said he would rein in current work programs that admit foreign nationals for periods extending well beyond the duration of their jobs and that permit them to bring their families.

He also thinks that if the U.S. cracks down on workplaces that hire undocumented workers, illegals will leave on their own.

"Certainly, I've read news reports of people simply deciding that the environment has changed and leaving on their own. If you take away the incentives, that will occur."

Harvey

Businesses should be required to verify the citizenship of employees through a national database and the government should "significantly fine them if they are knowingly hiring illegal immigrants."

Taxpayers are heavily burdened by illegal immigrants who show up in emergency rooms and send their children to schools, Harvey said.

Cracking down on the workplace will resolve the problem of people who are here illegally, he said.

"They'll self-deport."

Ward

Ward said Americans should be more concerned about the possibility that terrorists are entering the country illegally.

"We can find ways to accommodate people who want to come here legally and work, but we need to secure the borders from those who mean us harm," said Ward.

The Mexican border isn't the only problem, Ward said.

Terrorists could come by sea or across the Canadian border. He would give the Coast Guard a greater role in homeland security.


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