Utah's delegation to Washington

Poor Utah. They don’t have much help in Congress when it comes to fighting illegal aliens. It seems they are all in favor of legalization. (It worked so well in 1986. Why not?)

A case in point is Chris Cannon, a member of the House since 1997. Chairman of the Western Caucus. His Brother Joe is Editor of the Deseret News.

Chris was in Salt Lake this week and spoke with the Tribune about this immigration problem. (It seems funny to me that Hatch and Bennett are also in town and also speaking out about the immigration problem. Something’s up. Maybe they’re sending a message to the state legislature.)

Where Chris gets his campaign money:
http://query.nictusa.com/cgi-bin/can_give/2007_H6UT03042

So, Chris makes some interesting statements in his interview with the Tribune:
1) The immigration system is broken. (OK Chris, what have YOU done about it in the ten years we’ve been sending you to Washington?)
2) The Swift raids were ordered by Congressmen up for re-election in November of 2006, except the raids were supposed to be done in October. (Now Chris, ICE is not under congressional control. There is this branch of government called the “Executive Branch” that executes or carries out the laws you write over in Congress. Congressmen don’t order ICE to do anything. The President does. And he’s as pro-illegal as you are.)
3) Employment verification doesn’t work. (Chris, you say you heard that right from Chertoff’s mouth? That would make quite a headline if you could prove it because Chertoff is fighting hard to get people to use it. And have you reported this information to anyone, Chris?)
4) Immigration raids are targeting specific companies. (Well Chris, how about making E-Verify mandatory for all businesses? That would level the playing field. And unless you haven’t heard, these raids are based on high numbers of Social Security number violations. Meat packers seem to have a problem in that area.)
5) Fixing the problem would paralyze business. (Chris, we can see who you work for with comments like that. Remember the voters? The ones who subsidize the problem with their taxes and insurance costs? The ones who have their identities stolen? Take a couple of minutes and think about them.)
6) Illegals keep the economy going. (See #5 above. At what cost?)
7) Amnesty is the answer. (Well, it would get you off the hook for a few years, but it doesn’t do a thing to fix the problem itself. How does amnesty help alleviate all the problems that are funded locally? How are you going to hold back the Third World in the future if you legalize this bunch?)

But Hatch was no better. He spoke about the problem on Tuesday. Orrin thinks we are making good progress with the wall at the border, which shows you the reality he lives in. Then Hatch gets real vague with "find some humane, decent way of first identifying them and then going on from there." Hatch has been in Washington even longer than Cannon. He first showed up in 1977. After 30 years and all those studies, he ought to have a better idea than identify them and then go on from there.

Senator Bob Bennett said it was a real tough problem and nothing was going to happen in this election year. Bennett went to Washington in 1993.

So, Utah, what have you got? You’ve got the Church telling politicians to be kinder and gentler, and the ones in Washington are all talking amnesty. And why not, there’s good money in agri-biz donations.

The sad part is that the state reps are now going soft as well. It ain’t looking good, folks!