No Congressional Representation for Illegal Aliens - Candice Miller plans constitutional amendment

email | 6-13-05

[GVnana]

A Congresscritter with guts. How refreshing!

[Happy2BMe]

BTTT

[longtermmemmory]

bump.


seems reasonable.

[azhenfud]

"The rats will throw themselves into a volcano before allowing this to get anywhere."

Let's make it our priority to stoke the flames hot enough so they'll surely singe if they try otherwise.

[shellshocked]

Outstanding! You'd think this was already happening, but it isn't. They count illegals, which means they get representation.

[B4Ranch]

Illegal aliens are a security threat to our nation. They are an
economic threat to our economy. And my next guest says they are a
threat to our democracy itself.

Congresswoman Candice Miller of Michigan says her state and many
others are losing representation in Congress, because of the federal
government's failure to control our borders and immigration. She says
the bedrock notion of one man, one vote is in jeopardy. Congressman
Miller joins us tonight from Capitol Hill.

Congresswoman, I want to say first of all it's a great pleasure to
have you here.

REP. CANDICE MILLER (R) MICHIGAN: Thank you.

DOBBS: And I want to compliment you for taking on an issue that
everyone has ignored save yourself, and that is the issue of
representation and what is happening to this country as a result of
illegal immigration on the census in the Congress. How could this have
been permitted to go on so long?

MILLER: You know, perhaps ignorance. And I have to say I as well was
not aware of this. So I just think as i've just dropped this in the
hopper this week, actually literally in one week we are getting so
many cosponsors. And what it is -- and first of all it's called House
Joint Resolution 53. And it basically is asking for a constitutional
amendment on to the 14th amendment of ridiculously simple
constitutional amendment, literally changing a word, really. It
currently says "people." In other words, the census bureau has to
count all the people in each state. And I'm saying they should count
citizens. And if they were to do that and only count citizens, there
would actually be nine congressional districts that would be changing.

DOBBS: Again, because the census is now required to count persons as
required by the 14th amendment of the constitution, and because we
have an estimated, as many as 20 million illegal aliens in this
country, the fact is that various states are simply -- they have more
seats in Congress as a result of a census that includes illegal
aliens? MILLER: It's really true. And a perfect example, no surprise
to anyone, I suppose, is California. And just to give you a very vivid
example, in Michigan tenth, the tenth congressional district in
Michigan that I represent, the census says that the citizen population
in my congressional district is 98 percent. In the 31st district of
California, that's down where the Dodger stadium is, the census
district says there is only 59 percent citizens within that
congressional district. So you have several hundred thousand
noncitizens who literally have the same vote on the floor of the
United States House of Representatives as people who are taxpaying
citizens of America. It's outrageous.

DOBBS: And it is outrageous. And we want to show everyone what the
impact of this is, as best it can be discerned. Now, there are a
couple ashumions we have got to talk about. One is, when you said 59
percent citizens in the 31st Congressional District in Los Angeles,
that's based on some assumptions. But one assumption that we can make
is that illegal aliens are underreported in point of fact in the
census.

MILLER: Very much so.

DOBBS: And secondly, that the impact is probably even more profound
than what we're about to show you. And what Congresswoman Miller has
analyzed to this point, let's put up this map that we'll show you.
These are the congressional seats that will be lost after illegal
aliens are counted in those seats, these states alone.

Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Mississippi, Montana, Pennsylvania, Utah
and Wisconsin, each would lose one seat. Meanwhile, California has
gained six seats. Florida, New York and Texas each gaining one seat.
What does this mean in dollars and cents? We understand what it means
in terms of representation. A lot of people, a lot of states in which
there are not illegal aliens, imagine that we can look at this as an
advantage, I guess, politically to have illegal aliens. What is the
impact in dollars and cents?

MILLER: Boy, it would be really hard to estimate what it is.
Obviously, there are some guesstimates that illegal aliens cost our
society $20 billion to $30 billion. When you think of the impact on
our educational system, on our hospitals, health care systems, et
cetera, I think it would be difficult to say what that is, what the
dollar amount is.

But it is an easy thing for people to understand, that this is an
issue very much, a basic issue I think of principle and of fairness.
And as you mentioned in the outset here, Lou, really, our democracy,
our entire system is based on a fundamental caveat of one man, one
vote; yet you have all these illegal aliens who can't even vote or
shouldn't be voting if they are, and yet they have the same
representation as a citizen, and citizens are having their vote
diluted. And it just is very, very unfair.

DOBBS: If nothing else should awaken people in this country to the
crisis that we're facing in terms of illegal immigration, the fact we
basically turned over the immigration policy of this country to
President Vicente Fox, since this president and this Congress won't
take the lead on immigration policy and enforcing immigration laws,
this certainly should, because we're throwing away American
representation, American political values. It's extraordinary.

MILLER: It's unbelievable. They really are having sway. Illegal aliens
in this country are having sway on national policy. Votes that are
happening each and every day in the United States Congress on policy,
on budgetary kinds of things, on national security, on homeland
security, on whether or not we should be enforcing our borders better
than we are, all of these kinds of things illegal aliens are being
represented on the floor of the United States Congress, and it has to
stop. And again, it can stop by a very simple constitutional
amendment. House Joint Resolution 53 for any of your listeners that
want to lobby their own members of the Congress, particularly in these
states that are losing seats because of this, certainly those members
of Congress, and talk to the senators as well.

DOBBS: As a matter of fact, what we'll do, that's HR 53...

MILLER: Yes.

DOBBS: Congresswoman Candice Miller introducing the legislation.
You've picked up sponsors. Is it your sense you're going to have the
support necessary to move this through?

MILLER: I think it's going to be very difficult, Lou. I think it's an
uphill battle, but I think it's a fight worth fighting, because a
constitutional amendment, of course, is very difficult as it should
be, but it does require two-thirds vote in both chambers, in both the
House and the Senate, and then three-quarters of the states must
ratify.

DOBBS: I don't think that the founding fathers, as prescient and wise
as they were, could ever imagine that future generations of Americans
would choose to ignore the nation's sovereignty and its borders.
Certainly this looks like an issue in which it's time to make amends,
and in this case amend the constitution.

Congresswoman, we thank you. It's House Resolution 53, HR 53. We're
going to put it on our Web site. We're going to ask you to also, if
you would like to support Congresswoman Miller's legislation, go to
her Web site. We'll have it on ours beginning this evening. So we
thank you very much for being here.

MILLER: Thank you so much.

DOBBS: Still ahead, he tried to run to Mexico, but couldn't hide, as
it turned out. A wanted illegal alien now facing justice in the United
States. Is this the beginning of cooperation between the Mexican
government and U.S. authorities? We'll see. And we'll have the story
for you.

Later, "Exporting America." My guest tonight says outsourcing is a
lose/lose situation for American employees, businesses, and yes, even
the U.S. government. The author of "Outsourcing America" will be here
to tell us why. Stay with us. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DOBBS: Los Angeles officials tonight are claiming victory, now that
fugitive alien Ricardo Rodriguez is back in U.S. custody. Rodriguez is
wanted for trying to kill two sheriff's deputies. He thought he could
escape U.S. law by running to Mexico. This time, he was wrong. Casey
Wian reports from Los Angeles.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CASEY WIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Ricardo Rodriguez, a
Mexican illegal alien, is accused of fleeing two sheriff's deputies
trying to pull him over for running a red light. After a brief chase,
deputies say he opened fire on them with an assault rifle, just 100
yards from a playground filled with children.

No one was injured, but Rodriguez, like so many other criminals facing
either life in prison or the death penalty, escaped and fled to
Mexico. A year later, he's back in U.S. custody, in a rare case of
cooperation by the Mexican government.

STEVE COOLEY, LA COUNTY DA: We are hopeful that this one particular
case today is a good beginning, a first beginning, to help resolve
some of the issues that remain between authorities on this side of the
border and our Mexican counterparts.

WIAN: Rodriguez is the first suspect facing life in prison extradited
by Mexico to Los Angeles in four years. Because of a Mexican Supreme
Court ruling in 2001, Mexico refuses to extradite suspects who face
either life in prison without parole or the death penalty. A members
of the Mexican attorney general staff says Rodriguez was returned
because he will be eligible for a parole hearing within 60 years. He
says it does not represent a change in Mexican policy.

In recent years, Mexico has nearly tripled the number of criminals
extradited to the United States. Still, hundreds of murderers, rapists
and other violent criminals are either in Mexican jails or running
free there.

SHERIFF LEE BACA, LA COUNTY: When you put this in the context of the
hundreds of cases that the district attorney's office has to handle
regarding illegal immigrants fleeing back to their home countries,
this is a small step in the right direction, but, indeed, it is in no
way reflective of the magnitude of the problem that we here.

WIAN: Los Angeles DA Cooley wouldn't say if this case would hasten the
capture and extradition of Armando Garcia, the alleged killer of LA
Sheriff's Deputy David March. He did say, wait until that day arrives,
and you'll see how much justice will receive.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WIAN: In the meantime, two Republican lawmakers are planning to
introduce legislation that would deny foreign aid to Mexico or any
other country that refuses to extradite cop killers without strings
attached, Lou.

DOBBS: An important step also. This may be an important beginning
between the government of Mexico and the United States, and certainly
District Attorney Cooley and Sheriff Baca deserve great credit for
their unrelenting efforts to bring about justice here.

WIAN: Absolutely, and those efforts are continuing. Both law
enforcement officials say they are aggressively pursuing cop killers
and other suspected murderers in Mexico and that they are beginning to
get more cooperation from Mexican authorities, Lou.

DOBBS: Casey Wian, reporting from Los Angeles. Thank you, Casey.

The government of Mexico this afternoon gave us this statement
regarding the Rodriguez extradition. The Mexican government telling
us, quote, "With the extradition of Ricardo Rodriguez by Mexico to the
United States, the government of Mexico illustrates once more its
compliance with the obligations set forth in the bilateral treaty of
extradition."