In what Dan Stein, the Federation for American Immigration Reform's president called "another big victory", the opponents of Proposition 200 lost a key appeal to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco which would have allowed benefits to be given to illegal aliens.
In reporting on the story on January 15, the open-borders Arizona Republic still insisted on calling illegal aliens "undocumented immigrants", [Prop. 200 injunction rejected by court, Yvonne Wingett, Arizona Republic, Jan. 15, 2005]. But the law now goes into effect and means that welfare benefits don't get paid to illegal aliens.
Gee, that seems absolutely fair. And it is!
The Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF) filed the injunction to keep the law from being in effect. Now MALDEF is in the position of having to argue the case on its merits. Proposition 200 may escape the shabby treatment accorded California's Prop 187, which was tied up in the courts from which it never escaped.
As Phoenix's KFNX Talk Radio put it:
"As the 57% of Arizona voters who passed Proposition 200 bite their nails, challenges continue to materialize. Thousands of Arizonans worked for months and even years to bring about the most important voter initiative in state history and actually pass it into law.
"The amazing David and Goliath story of insurmountable opposition from cheap-labor profiteers and their political whores against the citizenry is a rare victory in 'big money always wins' arena."
Well, the battle is not won yet but as KFNX points out:
"Strength in numbers isn't always a guarantee of victory. While 80% of Americans want border security, aliens deported, and no amnesty of any kind, their voices are likely to be crushed by the big corporate shoe. Imagine if you could suddenly cut your bills/debt in half, or double your income at will. That is exactly what significant numbers of businesses have accomplished with cheap illegal labor. Business rakes in windfall profits, hands a chunk to politicians, and a couple of winks later America is up to its armpits in third-world rejects."
"The passage of Arizona's Proposition 200 was a wounding blow to the 'golden egg' coveted by the business-government marital partnership. Twenty-three other states are threatening to deliver similar wounds. The man and wife team of big business and government have no intention of surrendering their new-found pot of gold to the demands of 80% of Americans. Now, much more that six months ago, the battle to negate the vote of the people is warming up."
It surely is. Bush has identified "immigration reform" a.k.a. Open Borders as a major goal of his second term. His amnesty proposal, which will be eagerly backed by Arizona's Senator John McCain and certainly by key Democratic Senators such as Ted Kennedy, and certainly by Nancy Pelosi, House Minority Leader, would let a huge number of illegal aliens (some say as many as 20 million) become legal US residents with access to welfare programs—something Prop 200 now stops.
Folks, these greedy leaders and their business paymasters are giving away our rights and our treasure without your permission. There is nothing wrong with requiring proof of citizenship to vote and obtain welfare benefits and that is exactly what Proposition 200 does. Let's get real, Congress!
Obviously the Arizona border is one of the busiest entry points from Mexico. But the fact that Arizona spends millions to give public services to illegal aliens is only the tip of the financial iceberg.
Bush could be a lame duck President right at the get go! Many of his own faithful party members are mad as hell and not willing to play this dirty amnesty rip-off game against their protesting constituents. We are not talking about ethnic anger, we are talking about citizen anger, anger against all the cuts taken out of our pocketbook by people who have no legal right to be here.
The average American did not perpetrate this situation. It was carefully engineered over many years by the cheap labor crowd using the ethnic lobbies like MALDEF as stalking horses.
Now we must stand up against the abrogation of the Rule of Law or we won't have a country to call our own.
Donald A. Collins [email him], is a freelance writer living in Washington DC and a former long time member of the board of FAIR, the Federation for American Immigration Reform. His views are his own.
