RICHMOND--Reluctant to wait in an election year for recommendations from a study committee, Republicans legislators yesterday announced several initiatives they say will help combat illegal immigration.
House Speaker Bill Howell, R-Stafford County, along with Senate Majority Leader Sen. Walter Stosch, Sen. Jay O'Brien, and Del. Dave Albo, said they will introduce legislation to strengthen sheriff's office's authority to question the legal status of those arrested for crimes, and to eliminate bail for those known to be illegal immigrants.
They also want legislation to revoke the state business license of any company found guilty at the federal level of hiring illegal workers, and to ban anyone without a valid visa or proof of legal status from attending Virginia public colleges and universities.
The lawmakers did not have statistics on how many companies are convicted at the federal level of hiring illegal workers, or of how many illegal immigrants might be attending state colleges.
The legislators said public frustration with illegal immigration is mounting, and that the federal government is not moving to solve the problem, so they feel it's time to take matters into the state's hands.
But the state's abilities to enforce federal immigration law are limited, because the constitution prohibits states from pre-empting federal laws. That's something that's being studied by the state Crime Commission's illegal immigration task force.
Albo, who co-chairs the task force, said legislators feel comfortable moving ahead with things that are clearly constitutional, although few things in immigration law are clear at all.
"We know all these are constitutional," Albo said of the Republicans' proposals. "The law is so murky in other areas."
USE ICE DATABASESpecifically, the Republicans are planning legislation to require that the name of anyone arrested is run through the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement database, to determine whether that person has been previously identified as an illegal immigrant.
If so, lawmakers also want to bar that person from being let out on bail.
And they also want to require that every jail in the state have a staff member who is federally certified to enforce immigration laws.
With such a certification, those staff members could detain identified illegal immigrants and begin deportation proceedings, lawmakers said.
None of those proposals would affect illegal immigrants who have not already committed crimes.
The Republicans did not specifically offer new funding to allow sheriff's offices to carry out these new tasks; they said they hope federal immigration officials will provide some funding.
The lawmakers said the proposals are backed by the full Republican caucus in both houses.
The Crime Commission's immigration task force expects to make recommendations for legislation at its October meeting.
IMMIGRATION LAW MURKYA lack of understanding of federal law has hampered previous legislative efforts to crack down on illegal immigrants in Virginia, said task force chairman Sen. Ken Stolle, R-Virginia Beach. He cited eight bills on illegal immigration that died in the Senate Courts of Justice committee in the 2007 session; seven of those, he said, would have been unconstitutional.
But lawmakers, like local police, don't fully understand how the federal immigration agencies operate; how they can use those operations to their benefit; and what the state is prevented from doing by law.
But with all 140 General Assembly seats up for election in November, and illegal immigration being an increasingly hot topic as localities start taking matters into their own hands, Republican legislators have decided not to wait for the task force to finish its work.
"Presenting these ideas is a way of telling the public where the Republicans are" on illegal immigration, O'Brien said. "That's why we're coming forward now in the context of an election."
Republicans plan to roll out other policy proposals as the fall election season kicks into gear after Labor Day.
Chelyen Davis: 804/782-9362| IMMIGRANTS IN JAIL
Information presented to the Crime Commission's immigration task force on Tuesday indicated:
Illegal immigrants make up 6 percent to 10 percent of the people incarcerated in Virginia jails and prisons. The number was hard to pin down exactly because it's not always easy to prove someone is here illegally. Northern Virginia localities, such as Fairfax and Prince William counties, have the highest numbers of illegal immigrants in custody. Rappahannock Regional Jail was 12th in the number of illegal immigrants who passed through at some point in 2007. That jail had 260 "proxy" illegal immigrants--the Crime Commission staff's term for it, because there is no easy checkbox to determine legal status--come through in fiscal year 2007. The state will need to provide more money to sheriff's offices to help provide the staff and training to do more monitoring of illegal immigrants who are arrested for crimes. |