Governor Schwarzenegger, Release Illegal Alien Criminals Back to their Homes Not Ours

The Sacramento Bee reported Thursday that the Governor will ask the state legislature to authorize the release of 22,000 “non-serious” and “non-violent” offenders into our communities. The plan would save the state about $250 million annually.

Who are these “non-serious” non-violent” felons?

According to former state Sen. Jim Nielsen who chaired the California Board of Prison Terms from 1991 to 2000 and later served as Deputy Commissioner until 2007, the law considers human trafficking, child abuse, domestic violence, pimping a child for prostitution, solicitation to commit murder, elder abuse, hate crimes, torturing and killing a domestic animal, manufacturing methamphetamines, armed burglary, firearms felonies, sending Internet porn to minors, creation of child pornography, solicitation of rape and child molestation as non-serious and non-violent crimes.

Ask a battered wife or abused child if they were the victims of violence at the hands of one of these non-serious – non-violent criminals, and you'll likely get a very different answer than the Schwarzenegger administration is now giving.

Guess how many inmates should not be in our correctional institutions or in our state for that matter?

According to various estimates from the Center for Immigration Reform, the Federation for American Immigration Reform and the Government Accounting Office, illegal aliens account from 15 to 18% of our inmate population. California offers free room and board to 173,000 inmates. If we take the lower estimate of the illegal alien incarcerated population the number should be roughly 26,000 inmates. Strikingly this number is very close to the target set by the Governor.

According to a report from the California Joint Committee on Prison Construction and Operations - California and its regional governments spend more than $500 million a year to arrest and imprison illegal aliens. The cost of incarcerating illegal aliens in California is twice the amount of money that the Governor would like to save by releasing 22,000 felons. The report estimates the total legal costs of crimes committed in California by people who are not legal U.S. residents is estimated to be between $1 billion to $1.5 billion a year. Think about the cost of property losses, lost wages due to injuries, insurance payments, medical payment; and emotional and psychological treatment to innocent victims and how that could swell the dollar amount that we are given. In addition to dollar amounts, how can we calculate the damage to our quality of life at the hands of illegal aliens harming us, our environment and our way of life?

What are our chances of getting harmed by the release of thousands of inmates?

CSUSD Professor Paul Sutton on a 2007 research paper documented a 70% recidivism rate for California inmates; a figured echoed by Governor Schwarzenegger in a June 2007 interview with the Washington Post. Los Angeles County Sheriff Leroy Baca, was quoted today as saying that releasing those 22, 000 inmates was going to seriously increase crime in the county.

The Governor and the legislature know full well that you and I have an excellent chance of being victimized by one of these 22,000 felons.

Another thing to consider is that illegal aliens loose in our streets cost us far more than citizens and legal permanent residents do, even criminal ones. Deported illegal aliens would result in permanent savings and a much better solution for a Governor that is rumored to aspire to the U.S. Senate. Illegal aliens cost the state taxpayers $10.5 billion annually in services according to CIS and other sources. Illegal aliens are less likely to have health insurance and Workman’s compensation than citizens holding a valid Social Security number, because their employers have hired them in order to exploit them and give them few if any benefits. To make up for that lack of care from the employers, illegal aliens turn to social services and us the taxpayers or in some cases us the crime victims. According to the U.S. Justice Department up to 40% of illegal aliens do not report income to the state or federal government because they fear apprehension and because they do not have a valid Social Security number. That is a lot of income not generating tax revenue.

Fortunately there is a solution that is practical, economical and fair to the citizens of the state.

I ask that the Governor enroll the prison system in the federal government’s E-Verify program. The E-Verify program is a free and easy to use online system that will verify person’s immigration and legal resident status.

The second suggestion is for the Governor to call the Department of Homeland Security Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and have the illegal aliens in our prisons picked up and deported.

So Governor, here are the telephone numbers:

(1) E-Verify Program 888-464-4218

(2) Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) 866-347-2423

For our citizens that are concerned about the Governor and the Legislature’s missteps in protecting us from economic and personal harm, the Governor’s office telephone number is 916-445-4341

While we are on this subject, there is something else we need. We need a double or triple layer security fence at the border with Mexico. Without a secure fence the inmates that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) deports today could be in our streets tomorrow again – that is the way it works today.

We the people have demanded a secure border and the House and the Senate voted for it and the President signed into law on October 26, 2006, just before the 2006 mid-term elections. The law and called the Secure Border Fence Act of 2006 and it allowed $3 billion to build it. The President never intended to build this fence even when he signed the bill. Many, even from his own Republican Party, believe he fudges on facts and figures depending on his true agenda. Border security, which is no more secure today than it was on September 11th 2001, is one those things where we will never know his true agenda. In one year, since the Secure Border Fence Act was signed he built only 5.1 miles out of the 700 miles required by the bill. Just this week, the Democrat leadership with an assist from Texas Republican Senator Kay Bailey Hutchinson (a close friend of George W. Bush) stealthily injected language in the Omnibus funding bill (soon to be signed by the President) that effectively kills the Secure Border Fence Act of 2006.

We as citizens have a right to re-address our unresponsive government. In regards to our border security, enforcement of immigration law, the fair and the cautious expenditure of our tax dollars, we have a splendid opportunity to be heard. We will have a presidential election in November of 2008. George W. Bush has refused to protect our borders and enforce immigration law in his 7 years in office. California Senator Dianne Feinstein, who is up for re-election, has been an unrepentant open-borders and pro-illegal alien advocate in all her years in office. Dianne Feinstein has caused us many billions of dollars in tax costs and has allowed millions of illegal aliens into our state consequential to protecting the interest of unethical big campaign contributor corporate interests that feed from cheap illegal alien labor. Take charge, Get informed, Get active and Vote.

For information on ethical candidates for office, log on to my website www.dolz.com and visit www.numbersusa.com and www.fairus.org

For a take on how foreign-born legal immigrants feel about illegal immigration visit these websites: http://dontspeakforme.org and www.LegalImmigrantsFirst.org

My name is Tony Dolz and I am a candidate for the California 30th U.S. Congressional District. I’ll see you at the voting booth.