Thread: VA: ACLU says legislature targeted Latinos

ACLU says legislature targeted Latinos

The civil liberties group says the immigration debate will flare up again in 2008.

BY HUGH LESSIG
804-225-7345
July 17, 2007

RICHMOND -- Most immigration bills failed in the 2007 General Assembly session, but the anti-immigration attitude of many Virginia lawmakers is "abundantly clear" and the debate will flare up next year, the American Civil Liberties Union said Monday.

The ACLU released its annual assessment of this year's legislative session that offered comment on bills ranging from the death penalty to gay and lesbian rights.

On immigration, the report expresses concern "that most of the bills targeted Virginia's Latino community as a whole, the vast majority of whom are legal residents of the U.S., and that many of the bills would have resulted in increased profiling of Latinos."

Some failed legislation sought to expand the power of state and local governments to enforce immigration laws. Others tried to block benefits for illegal immigrants, including a measure that would have denied less expensive, in-state college tuition to undocumented students.

Ultimately, several of the approximately 50 bills of interest to the immigration community passed the General Assembly, including one that established the Virginia Commission on Immigration to advise the executive branch.

ACLU Executive Director Kent Willis said he sees a pattern similar to the debate over abortion. Lawmakers are returning year after year to file immigration bills, as they have with abortion bills, either because the issue is important to them or because it sends a signal.

"We've seen this dramatic growth with issues related to immigrants' rights," he said, "if for no other reason that it's important as a political message. Until we resolve the immigration issue nationally, state legislatures are going to continue to introduce these bills."

Claire Guthrie Gastanaga is a lobbyist for the Virginia Coalition of Latino Organizations. She said the work of the new immigration commission would help set the tone for 2008, as would recommendations from a Virginia State Crime Commission immigration task force.

"I'm hoping that the crime commission task force will help folks understand (the issue) and reach some kind of sensible solution," she said.

And the immigration commission "will hopefully provide a forum in which some informed discussion should take place," she added.

Willis said a strong anti-immigrant message from the new advisory commission "could be the very impetus that some bills need to get through."

That could include the in-state tuition bill. It passed the House of Delegates 74-23, then died in the Senate on an 8-7 committee vote.

The measure is bad policy, Willis said, because it penalizes children whose parents chose to come here.

And, he said, college-educated people are less likely to commit crime and more likely to have a good job.

The ACLU doesn't get it, said Del. Tom Gear, R-Hampton.

"My only question to the ACLU is, what part of illegal don't they understand?" he said.

Gear supported the tuition bill and takes a hard line against illegal immigrants. Conservatives have nothing against people who come here legally and go through the process of becoming citizens, he said.

But, he said, "people are tired of all the illegal immigrants coming over here."

The ACLU report is available at www.acluva.org.

http://www.dailypress.com/news/local/dp ... ocal-final

gotta love the anti american civil liberties union.

i bet those bills say illegals and dont specifically say hispanics

cant help it though it the majority of illegals are hispanic though.
we never told them to come here

I am firmly against ILLEGAL immigration and want ALL illegal aliens removed from my country. Since 70% of illegal aliens pouring into my country are Mexicans, am I anti-Mexican? Hardly, I am against ALL illegal aliens being here. Since 70% of illegal aliens here are Mexican, they are the greatest proportion of the mass of illegal aliens that I am firmly against. Even if 70% of the illegal aliens here were on the Swedish bikini team...I would be against their presence and would want their removal.

Originally Posted by jamesw62

gotta love the anti american civil liberties union.

i bet those bills say illegals and dont specifically say hispanics

cant help it though it the majority of illegals are hispanic though.
we never told them to come here

This is the biggest flaw in the Another Communist Leftist Union's argument. None of the anti-illegal immigration bills that have been introduced mention anything about targeting latinos, hispanics, or any other wording which singles out a certain ethnic type.

All of them specifically target illegals, and for some reason the ACLU has to put this twist on it to support their lame side of it.

Obviously to the aclu, upholding the rule of law is somehow un-constitutional. What a worthless group of losers.

There's a shocker!!! The MCLU disagreeing over laws to to punish illegals and protect Americans!!

IMMIGRANT'S RIGHTS not ILLEGAL'S RIGHTS. What about CITIZEN'S RIGHTS? They don't seem to count with the ACLU.