LA Times Bloomberg Poll on Bush Amnesty Immigration Bill is Flawed
The above statements are highly misleading.
The gravest misrepresentation of the answers to the poll questions is the unjustified linkage the Los Angeles Times makes between what the polls suggests is tolerance by a majority of Americans for “a path to citizenship” for illegal aliens and an “immigration overhall bill”. “Immigration overhall bill” is as close as the Los Angeles Times gets to giving a name to President Bush’s amnesty bill introduced in the Senate as Senate Bill 1348 (SB-1348). Whereas the Los Angeles poll shows support for putting “undocumented aliens in a path to citizenship” if they pay fines, learn English and meet other requirements, the Los Angeles Times misleadingly implies that SB-1348 meets those conditions and that therefore the poll indicates support for SB-1348. None of the poll questions refers by name to SB-1348 or to “Comprehensive Immigration Bill” as it is sometimes referred to in the media or as the President’s Amnesty Bill as it is increasingly being called. More significantly, the poll did not ask if the respondents wanted the Senate to take up an “immigration overhall” or amnesty bill. To say that the people polled by the Los Angeles Times showed support for SB-1348 would be a complete fabrication.
The Los Angeles Times analysis also takes a swipe at the “enemy” as they see it of “immigration overhall” – “the conservative opposition”. This is absurd! Very few people other than President Bush; Secretary of Commerce, Gutierrez; Secretary of Homeland Security, Chertoff; Attorney General Gonzales and 8 elite senators representing both the Democrat and Republican Party know much about this 700 page amnesty bill. Why? SB-1348, the amnesty bill, was crafted in SECRET.
The bi-partisan elitist group that plotted SB-1348 purposely circumvented Senate protocol which calls for public hearings in committee and for environmental and fiscal impact reports, for example. Senators and expert witnesses that urged enforcement of current immigration laws before any new law be concidered, enforcement of employer sanctions; and among other things, the building of a 700 mile fence that the Senate and the House overwhelmingly voted for and the President signed into law in December 2006 were NOT invited to draft the bill. Transnational and domestic corporations that employ legal and illegal aliens; open-borders ethnocentric political lobbyists and groups that collect public and private funds to service legal and illegal immigrants, such as Catholic Charities were invited to contribute in the backroom negotiations. By keeping the negotiations closed door, the American people were also kept in the dark.
The elite 8 senators that played the key role in plotting SB-1348 sent a draft of the 700 page bill to the other 92 senators at 02:00 AM on Saturday, May 19 th. Starting on Monday, May 21 st the elite bi-partisan group tried to rush passage on the Senate floor while simultaneously stifling any amendment that threatened the most important component of the bill – the amnesty. Eventually it was resistance by a number of senators to the number of amendments they were allowed to introduce that caused Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, to pull the bill.
Contrary to what was intimated by the Los Angeles Times poll analysis, SB-1348 was not brought down by “conservative opposition”. As the Los Angeles Times noted on a previous article by staff writers Janet Hook and Nicole Gaouette dated June 9 th and entitled “Immigration bill drew fire from both sides”, SB-1348 has opposition from many quarters and few heroic supporters. The article quotes Senator Trent Lott (R-Miss) as saying "Their left flank hated it, and our right flank hated it". Sen. Schummer (D-NY) called SB-1348 “anti-labor” because massive legal and illegal immigration depress the wages of Americans and union members. Ethnocentric political action groups, like La Raza (the race) fought it on the grounds that it favored well educated foreigners who are not a burden to the taxpayer over the traditional preference given to family members of immigrants living in the United States. Corporate interests pulled their support when the number of “guest workers” was reduced to 200,000 per year. The Los Angeles Times is completely unjustified in saying the bill was pulled due to “conservative opposition”, a number of other Los Angeles Times articles fully documents that the opposition to SB-1348 is broad and extensive. Other than President Bush, very few in the Senate is happy with SB-1348.
Lets dissect the key question in the Los Angeles Times poll,
Q: Allow undocumented immigrants who have been living and working in the United States for a number of years, and who do not have a criminal record, to start on a path to citizenship by registering that they are in the country, paying a fine, getting fingerprinted and learning English, among other requirements. (Questionable issues are in bold)
The above question illustrates why there is no connection and no connection can be made between the responses to the poll and SB-1348.
- Foreigners in the country illegally are unauthorized illegal aliens, NOT immigrants. No matter how many times this has been made clear to the Los Angeles Times by its readers and critics, they still do not get it. The use of this term is inappropriate and leading term in a poll.
- Illegal Aliens DO NOT have to show W-2 forms or Tax Returns to document that they were “working” in the United States. SB-1348 only requires a statement from a friend that is not a family member stating that the alien did some work at some point in time. Very weak!
- Even illegal aliens who where here on January 1, 2007 get amnesty under SB-1348. The respondents answer can only be counted as in support of SB-1348 if amnesty was given to those living and working in the United States for a number of years. This is not the case under SB-1348 so the results of the poll do not apply.
- SB-1348 allows criminals, gang members and terrorists who sign a promise to be good to benefit from amnesty. Sen. Cornyn’s amendment intended to exclude certain categories of criminals but the senators who plotted SB-1348 with Sen. Ted Kennedy’s help managed to defeat the Cornyn Amendment by introducing a weaker version of the restriction instead.
- Under SB-1348 illegal aliens can get an INDEFINITE provisionary status that gives them all the rights and privileges of a legal resident without paying ANY PENALTY whatsoever and gives them 12 years to sign-up for English lessons. Yes, that is right, on the 12 th year of indefinite provisionary status they don’t have to show they can speak English only that they are enrolled in a class. The so called $5000 penalty in SB-1348 is misleading in two ways. The first is that the civil penalty for violating our borders is $5000. SB-1348 first forgives the civil penalty (amnesty) and then applies a $5000 penalty, so that the legalization of the illegal alien is seen as not an amnesty (that is a weasel maneuver). Secondly, those illegal aliens that do not apply for being on a path to citizenship DO NOT have to pay any penalty at all.
Incidentally, the notion that ANY illegal alien could live and work in the United States and not be committing crimes is naïve to the extent of being not credible when coming from a major metropolitan newspaper. Illegal aliens are not legally entitled to apply for and posses a Social Security number. In order to work they have to either steal a Social Security number or falsify one. Document fraud is a felony. The Department of Homeland Defense and the U.S. Department of Labor estimate that 40% of illegal aliens do not report their income. Tax fraud is a felony. Receiving tax paid educational, health and social benefits that they are not entitled to is fraud. It is impossible to be in the United States illegally and not to be in violation of numerous laws. All those constructed violations are forgiven in the Bush amnesty bill.
In summary, the poll question on measuring support for a path to citizenship to certain classes of illegal aliens has no correlation to SB-1348 and therefore the results cannot be used by Los Angeles Times analysts to demonstrate support for SB-1348.
For more information about the Bush amnesty bill you can read this article: http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=28070
Tony Dolz
www.DOLZ.com
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