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From the Los Angeles Times
Illegal immigrants again in the budget spotlight
The economic downturn has activists pushing for a measure that would limit the services Californians provide.
By Anna Gorman and Teresa Watanabe
July 10, 2009
As California lawmakers struggle with a budget gap that has now grown to $26.3 billion, one of the hottest topics for many taxpayers is the cost to the state of illegal immigrants.
The question of whether taxpayers should provide services to illegal residents became a major political issue in California's last deep recession, culminating in the ballot fight over Proposition 187 in 1994. That history could repeat itself in the current downturn, as activists opposed to illegal immigration have launched a campaign for an initiative that would, among other things, cut off welfare payments to the U.S.-born children of illegal immigrants. Those children are eligible for welfare benefits because they are U.S. citizens.
State welfare officials estimate that cutting off payments to illegal immigrants for their U.S.-born children could save about $640 million annually if it survives legal challenges.
California has roughly 2.7 million illegal residents, according to an April 2009 report from the authoritative Pew Hispanic Center, accounting for about 7% of the state's population. State officials estimate that they add between $4 billion and $6 billion in costs, primarily for prisons and jails, schools and emergency rooms. Beyond those services, the illegal population adds to the overall cost of other parts of local government, from police and fire protection to highway maintenance and libraries.
On the other side of the ledger, illegal residents pay taxes -- sales taxes on what they buy, gasoline taxes when they fuel their cars, property taxes if they own homes. The total is hotly debated, although most researchers agree that the short-term costs to state and local government are bigger than the revenues.
Many companies that hire illegal workers also withhold Social Security and income taxes from their paychecks, based on workers' invalid Social Security numbers. That money goes mostly to the federal government, not to localities. The Social Security Administration estimates that in 2007, illegal residents nationwide contributed a net of $12 billion to the system.
The largest costs to California's budget from its illegal residents are in three areas:
* Education: The state has no official count of how many students are in the country illegally because school districts do not ask. But the state legislative analyst estimated, based on data from the Pew Hispanic Center, that the state's 6.3 million public school students include about 300,000 illegal residents. At an annual cost of about $7,626 each, the total comes to nearly $2.3 billion.
* Prisons: In fiscal year 2009-10, California expects to spend about $834 million to incarcerate 19,000 illegal immigrants in the state's prisons. In Los Angeles County, illegal immigrants add between $370 million and $550 million annually to criminal justice costs, including prosecution, defense, probation and jails, according to Supervisor Mike Antonovich.
* Healthcare: The expected state tab for healthcare in fiscal 2009-10 is $703 million for as many as 780,000 illegal immigrants. Of that, $486 million goes to emergency services. But low-income illegal residents are also eligible for some nonemergency health services, including prenatal and postpartum care, abortions, breast and cervical cancer treatment and certain types of long-term care, such as stays in nursing homes. Most of the nonemergency care for illegal immigrants was authorized by the Legislature in the 1980s.
Much of those costs are beyond the control of state officials. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1982 that the Constitution forbids school districts to turn away children who are illegal immigrants. And federal law requires emergency rooms to treat everyone, regardless of citizenship.
How serious a problem those costs are is a subject of constant debate. "It is a catastrophic hit . . . on every level of government," Antonovich said.
State Sen. Denise Moreno Ducheny (D-San Diego) who heads the Senate budget committee, counters that illegal immigrants are net contributors through their taxes and labor in farming and other industries. Cutting services to illegal residents is "penny wise and pound foolish," Ducheny said.
The Center for Continuing Study of the California Economy, based in Palo Alto, has analyzed research on the costs of illegal immigration. Most studies show that at least in the short term, illegal immigrants, who tend to be poorer and have more children than average, use more in public services than they contribute in taxes, the center found.
But the center's director, Stephen Levy, said some of the long-term effects were positive. Educating illegal immigrant children, for instance, helps them eventually land better jobs and higher salaries, benefiting Californians with increased tax payments and more sophisticated work skills.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has said it is wrong to blame illegal immigrants for the state's fiscal problems. He has, however, proposed to limit welfare and nonemergency healthcare for illegal immigrants and their families. So far, the Legislature has rejected his plans.
One of the governor's proposals would place a five-year limit on state welfare payments to the U.S.-citizen children of illegal immigrants. That would affect approximately 100,000 U.S.-born children in about 48,000 California households headed by illegal immigrants, who receive a monthly average of $472. The measure could save $77 million annually, according to the governor's office.
Under another proposal, the governor could commute the sentences of some illegal immigrant felons in state prisons and shift them to federal detention centers. It costs the state $48,000 to incarcerate a prisoner, and the federal government reimburses about 12 cents on the dollar, according to state finance officials. The administration estimates that commuting sentences of 8,500 felons, along with other sentencing changes, could save $182 million, although other state analysts question that.
State cuts in health services could shift costs to counties, some of which have begun denying treatment to illegal immigrants to close their own budget gaps. "It really is a punt," said Farra Bracht of the Legislative Analyst's Office. "We just keep shoving more and more to the counties. . . . They are the providers of truly last resort."
Many state officials have called on the federal government to increase the payments it makes to the state for costs associated with illegal immigrants, because controlling the borders is a federal responsibility. So far, however, Washington lawmakers, faced with large deficits of their own, have not been willing.
And others say the nation's humanitarian traditions and long-term interests compel extending a helping hand to people such as Delia Godinez.
Godinez, a 43-year-old undocumented Mexican immigrant, left an abusive family and lives in transitional housing. Four of her five children are citizens and receive a total of about $650 each month from the state's CalWorks program. She also receives about $500 in federal food stamps and other vouchers.
Without the aid, the unemployed Godinez said, she wouldn't be able to provide for her family. She is studying English and hopes one day to open a business and get off welfare.
"I don't want to be my whole life with that help," she said.
Many advocates say the ultimate solution is to reduce illegal immigration, not to cut off critical services that could jeopardize public health and safety.
"When people come into the U.S., even illegally, they cross more than a physical barrier; they cross a moral barrier," said Steven Camarota of the Washington-based Center for Immigration Studies, which advocates immigration restrictions. "We don't like it if someone can't go to the emergency room. That's just our way."
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AN INITIATIVE TO HELP CALIFORNIA'S
BUDGET DEFICIT CRISIS:
CALIFORNIA TAXPAYER PROTECTION ACT
BORDER CONTROL BY STOPPING THE MAGNETS
The initiative requires illegal alien mothers to apply in person for a certificate designated for Foreign Parent, pay an additional fee, submit official government issued identification with photograph and fingerprint, all of which is transmitted to the United States Department of Homeland Security.
ENDS illegal aliens use of all public funded benefits including pre-natal and non-
emergency medical care. California is one of thirteen states with this taxpayer expense. In 1987, California had a teenage birth rate below the national average. Pre-natal commenced for illegal aliens in 1988. Four years later the teenage birth rate was twice the national average and the highest of any state. If you understand the multitude of long term problems that are transferred from one generation to the next which are caused by teenage births, you will support this initiative.
TERMINATES all child welfare checks that are now direct deposited into illegal aliens
bank accounts for the anchor babies. Many of these checks become remittances that are
sent out of the U.S. The Department of Health and Human Services confirmed the state
can require lawful presence of all applicants to prevent state block grant funds from going to illegal aliens.
The California Legislature allows issuance of child welfare to illegal aliens for 18 years.
Citizens can only receive the benefit for five years. Between 1988-1995 this welfare program quadrupled and continues to spiral out of control. In spite of the budget deficits the Legislature refuses to end this welfare magnet.
Public benefits to be issued to only those who are citizens, or qualifed aliens with signed affidavits verified for lawful status.
With your support to Taxpayer Revolution we can launch the legal movement to end birth tourism caused by the unconstitutional policy of automatic U.S. citizenship.
If "birth tourism," and all other welfare paid to illegal aliens had been stopped 20 years ago there would not be a state budget deficit today that is close to $42 billion dollars.
Please mail donations and self-addressed stamped envelopes for petitions to:
TAXPAYER REVOLUTION
P.O. Box 9985
San Diego, CA 92169
Formally supported by the American Legion, Department of California, Reps. Dana Rohrabacher and Brian Bilbray, Numbers USA, and more. Please see Endorsements. PLEASE CONTRIBUTE on-line now.
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Dobbs: Democratic hacks embrace lunacy of amnesty
NEW YORK (CNN) -- This new Congress was supposed to be different. Instead, it is being led by a gaggle of partisan hacks pandering to the same special interests and corporate masters as the previous Republican-led Congress. So-called comprehensive immigration reform legislation is about to take a privileged position on the Democratic agenda in the Senate. It will likely succeed, just as it did in that august chamber last year, when 38 Democratic senators sided with the president to pass the bill and tried to slam amnesty down the throats of the House of Representatives and their 300 million constituents. And the now Democratic-controlled House is likely to embrace rather than combat the lunacy of amnesty. The same characters are already shoveling the same nonsense that overwhelmed reason in the Democratic Party and the Bush administration last year. Front and center in their march to madness: The bill's sponsor, Senator Ted Kennedy, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Immigration Task Force Rep. Luis Gutierrez and House Judiciary Immigration Subcommittee Chairwoman Zoe Lofgren. Also meeting with Sen. Kennedy this week is the Archbishop of Los Angeles, Cardinal Roger Mahoney. The good senator is rounding up all of the usual suspects to lead the charge in advance of his introduction of the amnesty legislation, expected within the next week or two. Cardinal Mahoney has said point blank that his followers should disregard laws on immigration as a matter of Catholic conscience. This is the same Cardinal who fought all the way to the Supreme Court to keep secret all documents related to pedophilia among priests. But the Cardinal and other Catholic leaders are quick to embrace the laws of bankruptcy protection in order to not compensate victims of sexual abuse by members of the clergy and keep them out of the U.S. judicial system. So far, five such dioceses have done just that. The same corporate lobbyists and dominant special interests that drove last year's legislation are even more energetic this year, and they're enthusiastically helping Senator Kennedy write the new legislation. The biggest business lobby in the country, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and its associated organization, the Essential Worker Immigration Coalition, are actually writing parts of the bill, presumably so that none of our other senators would be unfairly burdened by actually doing their own work. Or perhaps in Senator Kennedy's estimation, they simply don't have the intellectual wherewithal to tackle the required mental heavy-lifting. Senator Kennedy and his staff claim they're not being secretive about the details of the so-called comprehensive immigration reform, but they're just not willing to tell the public or other senators how the bill is being constructed. Notable Republicans are growing increasingly frustrated by their exclusion from the process, taking some umbrage at the immigrant advocacy groups replacing them in that process. The Chamber of Commerce itself is feverish with expectation, confident their reform bill will certainly keep wages depressed. The Chamber claims there's a labor shortage in many of these industries: construction, housing services, leisure and hospitality. And that's where the cleverly named Essential Worker Immigration Coalition comes in. Founded, staffed and supported by the Chamber itself, the coalition is made up of the same industries claiming they desperately need more workers. But there is a non-trivial disconnect here: In each of those industries, a labor shortage leads to higher wages. Unfortunately for the EWIC and the Chamber, and really for American workers, real wages in those industries have been declining, suggesting a very real surplus, not a deficit, of unskilled labor. Yet this President and this Congress continues to push the adoption of a guest-worker program. It's no wonder they have matching approval ratings in the low 30s. Real wages in the overall construction sector have fallen nearly 2 percent since the start of the decade and nearly 4 percent since the recent wage peak in 2003. Construction workers in 2006 were making the same per-hour salary as they did in 1965 (measured in 1982 dollars). Landscaping workers have also seen real wages fall by nearly 4 percent since 2001. For the leisure and hospitality sector, workers are making the same per-hour salary as they did in 1972. I've said for years that we cannot reform immigration if we cannot control it, and we cannot control it unless we secure our borders and ports. Once again it is clear that corporate America, special interests and the out-of-touch elites of the Senate have little regard for truth, working Americans, the common good and the national interest. The Democratic Party is now putting working Americans and their families in the exact same position as the Republicans: last. This Democratic-led Congress and this Republican President seem intent on pushing middle-class Americans, and truth, into the shadows. We asked for bipartisanship. But I don't think we can stand any more of it.
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Lou Dobbs Tonight
Thursday, April 9, 2009
Plus, outrage after President Obama prepares to push ahead with his plan for so-called comprehensive immigration reform. Pres. Obama is fulfilling a campaign promise to give
legal status to millions of illegal aliens as he panders to the pro-amnesty, open borders lobby.
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