James' Controversial Comments Stir Up Latino Community

Story Created: Apr 23, 2008 at 4:39 PM EDT
Story Updated: Apr 23, 2008 at 6:36 PM EDT

A Mecklenburg County commissioner issues some strong statements about illegal immigrants.

Tonight, some in the Latino community say he has gone too far.

Mecklenburg County Commissioner Bill James says he's not backing down after what he said about immigrants last week.

The Republican compared illegal workers who pay taxes to drug dealers and prostitutes who pay taxes.

Those remarks are not sitting well with the Latino Community.

WBTV's Sarah Batista has more on why they say he's taking his comments to far.
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It was all the buzz, the headline on the local Spanish-language newspapers and the topic on Spanish radio too.

It all stems back to last week's commissioner meeting.

"This isn't anything remotely at issue," James said, "unless the real issue is to coddle illegals, suck up to a certain segment of the community."

Commissioner James asked the county to make local contractors use a tougher social security verification system.

He says it would crack down on illegal immigrants using fake social security numbers to get a job.

But commissioners disagreed, saying the system wasn't reliable and would only create more stress on employers.

Then came these comments.

James said, "Illegal immigrants do pay taxes..so do prostitutes and drug dealers."

Latino advocate Maudia Melendez thinks the comments were offensive.

"This needs to stop deragatory statements, directed at the community should not come from an official," she said.

But Commissioner James says he doesn't care if he offended anyone. "I don't care what ethnic background you're from, you follow the law."

"Instead of building bridges we are breaking bridges," Melendez said. She agrees illegal immigration needs to be dealt with, but in a different way, "by intelligent, compassionate people."

James said, "if you want to drive home the fact of what's really going on, you got to give it to them straight.

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