Fred supported immigration and guest workers when he was in the Senate:
Thompson Voted For a Temporary Guest Worker Program For Agricultural Workers. In 1998, Thompson supported legislation to help illegal immigrant farm workers temporarily stay in the U.S. The bill is “similar to the guest worker program supported by Bush.” The bill stipulated that if there are insufficient US workers to fill the number of positions offered by a specific employer, the attorney general shall admit enough foreign workers to fill these positions. It would also require the attorney general to conduct a study on whether the workers should depart the country upon the completion of their stay. [Newsmax.com, 6/6/07; CNS News, 6/5/07; Senate Vote #233, 7/23/98, S2260]
But Opposed Dealing With the Problems of Illegal Immigration:
Thompson Voted Against Creating An Agency To Deal With Employers Who Hire Illegal Workers. Thompson voted against authorizing $100 million to establish with the Immigration and Naturalization Service an Office for the Enforcement of Employer Sanctions to levy fines for employing illegal aliens and to educate employers about the law and ways to prevent employment discrimination. [Senate Vote #99, 5/1/96, S1664] Thompson Voted Against Establishing Programs to Verify That Employees Are Legal.
Thompson voted against killing an amendment that would have taken out sections of the 1996 Immigration bill that establishes pilot programs to verify that newly hired employees are eligible to work in the United States and the sections that prescribe national standards for birth certificates and drivers’ licenses. [Senate Vote #101, 5/1/96, S1664]
Fred gets “C” grade from Americans for Better Immigration.
According to the New York Post, “Americans for Better Immigration- a group that advocates deportation of illegals and a stronger border- rates Thompson an overall “C.” [New York Post, 6/13/07] link
His actions don’t match the rhetoric:
Thompson: Illegal Immigrants Already in the US “Aren’t as Much as a Concern.” Fred Thompson identified the major problem of immigration to be future illegal immigrants by saying “The 12 million [illegal immigrants] here aren’t as much as a concern as the next 12 million after that” at a Lincoln Club of Orange County speech. [Politico, 5/5/07] h/t
All of the employees of Wayne Farms processing, in Decatur, AL have received TB skin tests….the results are mind-boggling. Nearly one-third of the tests came up positive.
All of the employees at the Wayne Farms fresh processing plant in Decatur have received tuberculosis skin tests and 212 of them tested positive.
Health workers read and tabulated a final batch of tests Wednesday, said Scott Jones, interim director of the State Department of Public Health’s Tuberculosis Control Division. Of the 598 tests administered Monday, 165 tested positive.
In skin tests administered to 167 fresh processing employees Oct. 11, 47 tested positive. One of the 47 has active tuberculosis disease, which is contagious.
All told, 28 percent of those who received skin tests at the fresh processing plant tested positive.
While latent TB infection is not contagious, health officials say about 10% of these cases will become active TB if untreated. Coughing, laughing or talking can transmit the airborne tuberculosis bacteria.
“The majority of the folks that we’re dealing with in this situation are foreign born,” Jones said. “I would expect about 30 percent of them to test positive.”
Both employees with active TB disease are Hispanics born in countries with a high incidence of TB, health officials said.
After getting caught in a moment of doublespeak in last night’s Democrat debate, HRC today made a political calculation to fully endorse New York’s controversial proposal to issue Driver’s Licenses to illegal immigrants, handing the GOP a front-burner general election issue.
“Senator Clinton supports governors like Governor Spitzer who believe they need such a measure to deal with the crisis caused by this administration’s failure to pass comprehensive immigration reform,’” her campaign said.
Mrs. Clinton’s aides said her statement was intended to signal that she broadly supported Mr. Spitzer’s goal of awarding driver’s licenses to illegal immigrants. source
The issue of border security has galvanized conservatives, and is a hot-button issue in the Republican campaign. Just ask John McCain. For HRC to attach herself to amnesty for illegal immigrants, an issue that is favored by just 22% of voters, seems to me to be political suicide. Perhaps she figures she would rather take away the “double-speak” accusations from her Primary opponents, calculating that she can move back to the center in time for November 2008. If so, it is a risky strategy, and one that may prove to be more costly than she reckons.
Homeland Security’s Office of Immigration Studies released a report August 31 that estimates the number of illegal aliens residing in the U.S. is between 8 and 12 million. But the group Californians for Population Stabilization, or CAPS, has unveiled a report estimating the illegal population is actually between 20 and 38 million.
I had read a study almost a year ago, that stated the illegal immigrant population was estimated to be 33 million, and found it believable. It makes since that the number would have grown in that period of time by another 5 million. Based on the sheer volume of hispanic students in public schools, all across the nation, the lower number expressed by Homeland Security is obviously too low.
The screaming and whining in recent weeks, about ICE and local police working together, arresting and deporting illegals, is an action I strongly support, as well as the building of the fence on our Southern border. If our country will just continue to enforce the laws we have on the books, this crisis can be dealt with, and the flood of new illegal border crossers will diminish.
