History tends to repeat itself, but not always quite the same way when it comes to CIR.
It was 2005 and two senators were working hard to get comprehensive immigration reform legislation into place that would ultimately legalize millions of illegal workers. It was a glorious day when that bill was introduced on the Senate floor.
Senators McCain and Kennedy backed the bill by saying there was “nothing” more important to the nation as a whole than comprehensive immigration reform. Part of their introduction speech included remarks that indicated delaying this kind of legislation was simply not acceptable. “While that was a nice touch, the House later also passed a bill referred to as H.R. 4437, which made being in the U.S. illegally a crime. Talk about a mixed message,” indicated Sally Odell, an immigration lawyer at Rifkin Fox-Isicoff, P.A., in Miami and Orlando, Florida.
Fast forward five years later and we have what? “The Senate in Arizona passing a bill that makes being in the state illegally is a crime; a bill that lets local police investigate if they have a reasonable suspicion to think an individual is in the country illegally. Senator McCain’s response to that was he thought it was a very important step forward; a disturbing flip-flop from five years ago,” added Odell.
Local media reports also feature McCain saying he thinks that it would be OK to delay the Immigration Reform Bill because there would be no point in having reform without having secure borders. Again, another flip-flop. Add to this another ‘plan’ McCain and another senator introduced in April called the Ten Point Border Security Action plan, which, in a nutshell means the government would (if it’s approved) toss more money, guards and border patrol agents to secure the southwest border.
There are already 20,000 security personnel deployed to handle border security, and McCain now wants to add 6,000 more for mega bucks to jail illegal aliens in the US, at US taxpayers expense, instead of taking them out of the country right away. “Would the taxpayers be happy with that kind of a solution? Likely not, but this is an election year, and it explains why McCain is all over the map in his opinions,” Odell pointed out.
McCain is up for re-election and faces a tough fight against J.D. Hayworth. Hayworth lost his seat in 2006 because his anti-immigrant stance didn’t go over well with his border district voters. Now, it’s anyone’s guess who might win that state, but the battle will be an interesting one indeed.
“Stand back and also consider that the Arizona legislation comes really close to allowing law enforcement to do racial profiling and doesn’t really outline just what ‘reasonable suspicion’ is when it comes to suspecting someone is in the country illegally. It’s highly likely this particular legislation will wind up prompting civil rights lawsuits,” commented Odell.
Where will this all end up? It’s hard to tell, but the road to a resolution is evidently paved with many potholes.
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