state legislation

Democratic Gov. John Hickenlooper will sign legislation to grant in-state tuition for students in the country illegally who graduate from Colorado high schools.

The in-state rate is one-third the amount out-of-state students pay.

Democrat state legislators in Colorado are moving to repeal an immigration enforcement law passed with great bipartisan fanfare in 2006. This is a clear warning about the fate of any immigration enforcement promises made in the next federal amnesty “grand bargain.”

In 2006, Senate Bill 90 was passed to prohibit municipalities like Denver and Boulder from adopting sanctuary city policies to obstruct local law enforcement cooperation with federal immigration agencies... Denver was one of the first.

Under S.B.90, when a police officer has probable cause to believe that a person arrested for any crime is in the country unlawfully, he is required to notify the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, or ICE. If ICE asks for a “hold” on the person, local police then detains him. Cities are also prohibited from adopting any ordinance or policy that hinders cooperation with federal immigration enforcement. .

The Democrats advocating repeal of S.B.90 say it is obsolete and redundant because we now have the federal Secure Communities Program, or SCP. SCP requires that the fingerprints of all persons booked into any local jail be sent to federal immigration authorities to check against their database... so we no longer need to burden local law enforcement with the mandates of S.B.90.

The problem with this redundancy argument is that the two programs are not actually redundant. The two programs... operate independently of one another.

The other problem with the repeal is more serious: The federal Secure Communities Program is not what it advertises to be.

Like most of our federal immigration laws, the professed and advertised intent of the Secure Communities Program is being deliberately and systematically sabotaged by the Obama administration. Because SCP is a purely an administrative creation, not a program established by act of Congress, it can be modified or discontinued by President Obama or Janet Napolitano at any time. Thus, repealing Colorado’s anti-sanctuary city law would be abandoning a state law for a federal administrative program that may vanish tomorrow.

Enforcement of the Secure Communities Program depends on two factors:

1) what crimes Obama’s cronies in the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency consider worthy of detention and deportation – and at present that means only violent crimes, not serial DUIs or other misdemeanors and

2) what actions local sheriffs choose to take in response to the information provided by federal authorities.

Here’s the important point: All such decisions are purely discretionary. A local sheriff can be totally ignore the information ICE provides about his jail inmates who are illegal aliens and still be in full compliance with SCP.

For example, if the Denver County Sheriff chooses to disregard a notification that one of his jail inmates is an illegal alien who has been twice deported and is wanted for felony reentry, and releases that person on bond, no federal law has been violated...

So, what’s happening with SCP in Colorado? What percentage of illegal aliens identified by federal fingerprint records are actually detained and deported in each of Colorado’s 64 counties through the SCP program? Are more criminals aliens being deported since SCP was adopted across Colorado, or not?

We don’t know the answer to such questions, and neither do Colorado lawmakers. That’s because ICE does not release that information. We only know deportation totals for each state...

The federal Secure Communities Program has been continually weakened by the Obama administration. Democrats in Colorado now want to repeal Colorado’s own program and leave the state totally at the mercy of a completely discretionary and highly politicized Obama-run bureaucracy.

In 2006, Colorado Democrats, led by former Governor Dick Lamm, joined Colorado Republicans in enacting tough laws to restrict illegal immigration and help deport criminal aliens. There was in those days a consensus that everyone wanted criminal aliens removed, but that consensus has vanished now that Democrats control both houses of the state assembly and the governorship.

That tells us the real agenda of the Obama administration and Colorado Democrats. The only remaining question is how many Republicans will dance to that tune. Read more about Democrats plot to betray citizens on amnesty

Recognizing its party’s collective need to improve its standing with Hispanic voters, Republicans spent far less time arguing against [House Bill 1258] a proposal to roll back a 2006 state law that forces local law enforcement agencies to report anyone arrested for a crime who is suspected of being in the country illegally to federal immigration authorities...

So how many Republican lawmakers voted yes?
Just one: first-year Rep. Tim Dore, R-Elizabeth.

...The 36-26 vote by the full House sends the legislation to the state senate.

The bill does away with the state’s divisive 2006 requirement that law enforcement report suspected illegal immigrants to federal authorities. The law is spottily enforced, in part because of a new federal immigration law implemented since 2006 to snag illegal immigrants who get arrested.

Colorado sheriffs have testified in favor of the bill, arguing that it’s costing them resources and the community’s trust; and, they argued, it’s redundant now that Colorado is taking part in the federal government’s Secure Communities program...

CAIRCO notes:

As everyone except the GOP seem to know, immigrants vote Democratic. They vote for the party that gives them the most freebies. They will continue to do so, no matter how nice Republicans try to be to illegal aliens.

We also observed Colorado Sheriffs standing in unision against recent legislation to impinge on Second Amendment rights. Yet they now balk at cooperating with ICE on reporting of illegal aliens per bipartisan 2006 SB 90. We can't help but wonder whether perhaps they are partaking of medical marijuana on a regular basis.

  Read more about Anti-cooperation bill update: Immigration reporting repeal effort clears House, heads to Senate

According to U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet's website, reforming immigration policy and combating climate change are two of his key legislative goals.

A federal judge on Friday blocked illegal immigrants in the new "deferred action'' program from arguing in court they are being "irreparably harmed'' by the refusal of Gov. Jan Brewer to let them have Arizona drivers' licenses.

Judge David Campbell agreed to a request by the attorneys for the five individual plaintiffs in the lawsuit that they should not be questioned about how they obtained work or are driving. He said that issue is irrelevant to their legal claims that they are being denied equal rights or that the directive issued by the governor denying them licenses is preempted by federal law.

But Campbell said challengers cannot have it both ways.

"Plaintiffs will not be permitted to argue that they were forced to drive or work illegally and that they are irreparably harmed by the inability to work or drive illegally,'' the judge wrote. He said if information on how they were able to drive and get to work is off-limits to the governor, then the plaintiffs themselves cannot use it for their own legal purposes.

The ruling is significant because one key in the lawsuit filed late last year by the challengers is that the governor's order "severely frustrates their ability to obtain employment and achieve economic self-sufficiency.'' That could undermine their bid to convince Campbell at a hearing scheduled for next month to immediately block the governor's directive and to order the state to start issuing licenses to those affected... Read more about Judge: Illegal immigrants can't argue 'harm' by Arizona driver's license refusal

...As Democrats prepare to push for sweeping immigration reforms, the mainstream media has been quick to cite the statements of such beltway luminaries as indications that a Republican flip-flop on the issue is forthcoming...

Just a few short years ago in Colorado, Democrats too were leading the legislative charge against illegal immigration – a fact that has been largely absent from most media reporting on the subject.

Colorado’s mainstream media rarely describes the coming year’s fight over same-sex union legislation without describing its unceremonious death in the past. But a TCO review of recent news related to the debate over in-state tuition for undocumented students [illegal alien students] failed to uncover a single occasion in which reports mentioned that a Democrat-controlled Colorado legislature was responsible for enacting the state law that bars illegal aliens from receiving most public benefits. [2006 House Bill 1023]

Based on coverage of the in-state tuition debate, few Coloradans would guess that just over six years ago, Colorado State House Speaker Andrew Romanoff (D-Denver), and State Senate President Joan Fitz-Gerald (D-Golden) joined forces to pass an illegal immigration enforcement bill that was described in the Washington Post as “the toughest in the nation.”

So strong was the public demand for stricter immigration laws at the time that even the progressive Bell Policy Center couldn’t bring itself to oppose Romanoff and Fitz-Gerald’s far-reaching ban on taxpayer assistance for illegal immigrants.

In fact, Romanoff and Fitz-Gerald’s bill counted among its supporters such liberal stalwarts as then-State Representative and current Senate Majority Leader Morgan Carroll (D-Aurora) and then-Rep. Terrance Carroll (D-Denver) – who currently serves as a trustee at Metro State College, where he has been an outspoken advocate for illegal alien tuition discounts.

While the role of Democrats in stiffening Colorado’s anti-illegal alien laws has long since faded from media headlines in Denver, it was front and center three years ago during the contested Democratic primary for U.S. Senate between Romanoff and Michael Bennet....

...“It’s reminiscent of the Democrats flip-flop on civil rights in the 1960′s,” said State Senator Greg Brophy (R-Wray). “They went from destroying the effort to taking credit for civil rights in one big flop. Anything to win elections.”..

After being blasted by former U.S. Rep. Tom Tancredo during the gubernatorial campaign for running a “sanctuary city” as Mayor of Denver, Governor John Hickenlooper tried to walk a fine line on illegal immigration after being sworn in...

Since the November election, however, Hickenlooper has joined the growing chorus of Democrats who have pivoted on the issue. Once firmly on the fence in the in-state tuition battle, the governor is now among the idea’s loudest cheerleaders, plugging the contentious proposal during his State of the State address last week.

Hickenlooper’s conversion on the in-state tuition issue is a microcosm of the broader evolution of Democratic Party’s top brass on illegal immigration — an evolution almost entirely suppressed from the political narrative by Colorado’s leading media voices...

... the policies Democrats will be seeking to reverse won’t be policies authored by Republican hard liners. They will be seeking to reverse policies that were authored, passed and touted by Democrats– including some who are still serving under the gold dome. Read more about Analysis: Colorado Dems Retreat from Illegal Immigration Crackdown They Authored

California’s governor has vetoed a bill that would have allowed police and sheriffs to free undocumented immigrants from custody once they became eligible for release even if federal immigration authorities had asked to hold them for possible deportation proceedings.

In his veto message late Sunday, Gov. Edmund G. Brown Jr. said he could not sign the bill because under it, “local officers would be prohibited from complying with an immigration detainer unless the person arrested was charged with, or has been previously convicted of, a serious or violent felony.

Brown noted he would work with lawmakers to improve the legislation and said undocumented immigrants “play a major role in California's economy, with many performing low-wage jobs that others don't want.

“Comprehensive immigration reform -- including a path to citizenship -- would provide tremendous economic benefits and is long overdue,” he wrote. “Until we have immigration reform, federal agents shouldn’t try to coerce local law enforcement officers into detaining people who’ve been picked up for minor offenses and pose no reasonable threat to their community.”

  Read more about California Governor Brown vetoes bill that allowed towns to release undocumented immigrants

...the opinion serves as a road map, both for Arizona and for other states waiting in the wings with immigration-enforcement statutes of their own. It will enable them to exercise their police powers in ways that help protect the lives and property of lawful residents against an onslaught of illegal immigration and deliberate under-enforcement of existing laws by the federal government. That is very good news for the states. ...

The lower courts didn’t hold the “anti-sanctuary city” provisions of SB 1070 to be unconstitutional, and those provisions remain on the books and enforceable, unaffected by the Supreme Court’s ruling....

So where did Kennedy’s majority opinion go astray? In striking down the three provisions of the Arizona law, it bucked a recent trend of the court with respect to its pre-emption doctrine. There is no question that, in exercising its powers over naturalization and immigration, Congress can expressly pre-empt various state laws that would conflict with the federal law. But there was no express pre-emption provision in federal law that prohibited Arizona’s efforts...

Kennedy thus had to resort to various implied pre-emption doctrines, about which the court has grown increasingly suspicious. Field pre-emption, for example, has in the past recognized that when Congress so comprehensively occupies an entire field of the law, we can infer that it intended to displace any state authority over the subject. And “policy” pre-emption yields the view that states can’t act if, in the court’s judgment, they are undermining unspoken policy goals of the congressional statutory plan.

Both doctrines require the justices to engage in the highly speculative enterprise of what Congress might have intended by its silence, and, as I said, the court has grown increasingly suspicious of the very legitimacy of that enterprise... Read more about Where the Supreme Court Went Wrong in Arizona