Posted on 02/04/2005 4:26:13 AM PST by billorites
U.S. Rep. Tom Tancredo of Colorado wants to hold Presidential candidates' feet to the fire to help stop illegal immigration and secure the country's borders.
"This is an issue I want all the Presidential candidates to debate. I want the candidates when they come here to answer the questions, 'What are you going to do about the borders? Will you commit troops to the border?' " Tancredo, a Republican, said in an interview with The Union Leader.
Illegal immigration and securing the country's borders affect every aspect of American life, including jobs, health care, education and national security, he said.
"The issue is where do you get cheaper workers. Cheap is only that to employers, not to the American taxpayers," he said.
Tancredo came to New Hampshire on a two-day trip to raise the issue of immigration reform together with Angela "Bay" Buchanan, chairman of Team America, a political action committee focusing on immigration reform. Tancredo is the founding chairman of the organization.
Their first stop was to present an American Patriot Award to New Ipswich Police Chief Garrett Chamberlain; he detained nine Ecuadorian immigrants last summer, but federal officials told him to release them.
Tancredo will also speak on several radio programs, including the "Howie Carr Show" on WRKO radio today at 5 p.m. He will meet with Republican state representatives and conservative activists, and he will speak at Nashua Christian High School.
Yesterday, Tancredo was critical of the Bush administration's position to allow illegal immigrants already in the United States to remain here under a "guest worker" program. "He says he is against amnesty, and then in the next sentence he defines amnesty. That's Clintonesque, and it really bugs me," he said.
Tancredo said Bush is proposing amnesty and will encourage billions more people to cross the border illegally and tell everyone who entered legally they are suckers.
Congress last year authorized doubling the number of border control offices, but former Department of Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge refused to spend the money, he said. "If something (like the terrorist attacks of 9/11) happens, you tell me someone shouldn't be liable with the attitude of this administration," Tancredo said.
He said he will introduce a bill this session to double the number of border patrol officers and train them to use technology for better surveillance of the borders. He estimated it would cost about $8 million to double the border patrol and several billion dollars for the technology.
Until the number of patrol officers is doubled, Tancredo said, he would have the military help watch the borders. "We could seal the borders, but we choose not to" because of political pressure, he said.
He said he is finding more and more converts to his way of thinking.
"If this were not an issue for John Q. Public, it would not be an issue in Congress," he said.
Tancredo, in his fourth term in the U.S. House, serves on the House International Relations and Resources Committee and on the Budget Committee. He is chairman of the House Immigration Reform Caucus.
Tancredo was a school teacher before serving in the Colorado Legislature and then in the U.S. Department of Education during the administrations of Ronald Reagan and the senior George Bush. He was also head of the Independence Institute, a libertarian-leaning think tank in Golden, Colo
THANK-YOU !!! Can you believe a CA poster still so obsessed over a CO election ???
Sheeesh....Tom told his district why he was running again, even wrote them letters. In a post 9-11 world, he needed to be a strong voice in DC against illegal imm. & unsecured borders. His voters thought so too, they re-elected him 2-1.
Joe Stalin would be proud of the Denver-Post, taking a page right out of his playbook.
Propaganda from the Denver-Post and now Slate. I never thought I'd see this on the Free Republic.
This issue makes for some strange bedfellows. Just consider how quick the WSJournal will hurl the 'xenophobe' or 'nativist' charge at anyone on the Right who dissents from their Open Borders ideology, even when that dissenter is a solid ally on virtually all other issues.
True.
even when that dissenter is a solid ally on virtually all other issues.
Yes, thats also a good point. The globalist at the WSJ will put a knife in the back of this country for a few bucks.
"It pits those who put respect for the law first against those who put economics above all else. I'll maintain that a sound economy can only exist when built upon a just and trustworthy legal system"
Hmmm...Given its Any Rand's 100th B'Day, what would Hank & Dagney say about this...wasn't economics & production the point in "Atlas Shrugged"?.
You're welcome. Actually, PRND21 seems to be obsessed with making Tancredo look bad and has been posting the same "Tancredo used illegal aliens to work on his house" and "Tancredo lied about term limits" nonsense for quite some time now on Free Republic.
bttt
I also have to wonder also. I don't recall too many discussions between Hank and Dagney over national sovereignty, the overwhelming of social services, increases in crime, lost tax revenues, increased drug trafficking and a huge underground economy. It probably would have mucked up the plot too much. But that's the beauty of authoring a novel, book - Ayn Rand could include/exclude , emphasize/deemphasize the scenario any way she saw fit to make her point. She created the world of 'Atlas Shrugged' within certain boundaries (or 'borders', if you will)
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