Thread: More than a fence against illegal aliens

http://www.roanoke.com/printer/printpag ... rcID=43449

Virgil Goode Jr.

Goode, of Rocky Mount, represents the 5th District in the U.S. House of Representatives.

While I appreciate the editors of The Roanoke Times giving some attention to the TRUE Enforcement and Border Security Act, H.R. 4313, on the editorial page ("Immigration absurdity survives the election," Nov. 15), I only wish the whole bill had been addressed.

The bill I introduced along with California Congressman Duncan Hunter does provide for construction of a fence along the U.S.-Mexican border. However, the fence is only a small part of the bill's plan to control mass illegal immigration. If your editors had focused on the whole bill, they would have discovered that we, too, believe that a fence alone will not solve this national crisis.

What we and the 20 other original sponsors seek to do is systematically eliminate the reasons why people come to this country illegally. The bill would create an effective process for verifying the legal status of workers and punish employers who fail to comply. It would also deny employers a business expense tax write-off for illegal aliens on their payrolls.

Under our bill, illegal aliens would not be rewarded with automatic U.S. citizenship for children born in this country, they would not be allowed to take advantage of the earned income tax credit, nor would they be eligible for just about every non-emergency public benefit or service. Our bill would address the illegal crisis not just with a fence, but by eliminating the incentives to come or remain here illegally.

As for the editors' remarks about the "obscene" costs of putting a fence along our borders: The high-end estimate of $7 billion is actually less than what California alone spends in just one year on public education for illegal aliens in that state.

As my friend Chairman Hunter said the other week, if the fence does cost $7 billion, it is still quite a savings compared to the $70 billion illegal immigration costs us each year.

And, if we really want to talk obscenity, we might want to consider the life of a Dallas police officer who was gunned down recently by a criminal illegal alien who had previously been deported from this country and then sneaked back in across our poorly protected borders.

Multiply that tragedy by the countless others who have been victims of illegal alien criminals, and what is obscene is the price those Americans have paid for our failure to protect this nation's borders.

This article implies that the illegals ARE allowed to take advantage of the EIC. Does anyone have any solid facts about that???

I'd assume so for anchors anyway since they have SS #s.

That's a good point. The parents would have to be legal because the EIC is for people with minor children. Boy, it just gets worse and worse.