Report: Majority of Democrats on NYC council eyeing plan that will allow non-citizens to vote

Report: Majority of Democrats on NYC council eyeing plan
that will allow non-citizens to vote 1

NEW YORK CITY, NY- According to reports, Democrats on the New York City Council are eyeing a plan to allow nearly a million non-citizens the ability to vote in local city elections. 

The plan, backed by 34 Democrats on the 51-member New York City Council, would allow non-citizens with green cards, visas, and work authorization to vote in city elections so long as they have resided in the City for at least 30 consecutive days.

The plan indicates that legal immigrants on green cards or an employment visa who have lived in New York City for at least one month would be able to vote for mayor, comptroller, public advocate borough presidents, council members, and changes to city policy.

NY1 reported that the bill has backing of immigrant groups and a majority of the council, but faces skepticism from the de Blasio administration. Manhattan Councilman Ydanis Rodriguez, a main sponsor of the bill, stated:

“We need to recognize the contributions of our immigrant brothers and sisters. This is not about doing a favor to immigrants by allowing them to vote. If they pay their taxes, as I did when I had my green card, then they should have a right to elect their local leaders.”

Assemblywoman Catalina Cruz, who represents Corona, Elmhurst and Jackson Heights, and testified in support of the bill, said:

“Most of us came to this country looking for a better future for our families. We pay taxes. We send out children to our schools. We open up businesses. We ride mass transit and use our hospitals, just like you and I. But, unlike you and I, they don’t get to choose who represents them and their values.”

Non-citizens would not be authorized to vote in state or federal elections. Cruz added that non-citizen New Yorkers pay around $10 billion in taxes each year. She stated:

“This is taxation without representation, which stands contrary to the very principles on which our country was founded.”

Critics of the bill, including Mayor Bill de Blasio, argued over the legal framework of expanding voting rights on a city level. However, his administration has not taken an official position on the proposed bill. On WNYC, de Blasio said:

“I really believe this has to be decided at a state level according to state law.”

de Blasio added:

“We’ve done everything that we could possible get our hands on to help immigrant New Yorkers, including undocumented folks, but I don’t believe this is legal. Our law department is very clear on this.”

Councilman Robert Holden, a Democrat who represents the Maspeth neighborhood in Queens, is again opposing the bill, stating:

“Giving non-citizens the right to vote would greatly diminish the value of citizenship as well as the incentive for immigrants to make the commitment to this country and become citizens. Citizenship and suffrage must not be torn form each other.”

Councilman Joe Borelli, a Republican who represents Staten Island, said:

“Citizenship should matter and having someone reside here for 30 days and check some boxes shouldn’t entitle them to vote for the people who will tax us for the next generation.”

Councilman Steve Matteo (R-Staten Island) added:

“Forget the fact that this bill is not likely to withstand a legal challenge, it diminishes the value of citizenship by giving away the right to cote to a broad swath of non-citizens, including some who have had their deportations stayed by a judge and given work authorizations as a technical matter, or others who are here to work and have no interest in becoming US citizens.”

The majority of the city’s foreign-born populations have arrived from the Dominican Republic, China, Mexico, Jamaica, Guyana, Ecuador, Haiti, Trinidad, Bangladesh, and India.

Do you want to join our private family of first responders and supporters?  Get unprecedented access to some of the most powerful stories that the media refuses to show you.  Proceeds get reinvested into having active, retired and wounded officers, their families and supporters tell more of these stories.  Click to check it out.

Democrats vote to open up amnesty plan for illegal immigrants to include sex offenders and gang members

September 16th, 2021

WASHINGTON, DC – According to reports, House Democrats voted against measures that would prohibit the likes of registered sex offenders and identified gang members from benefitting from a de facto amnesty effort though the budget reconciliation process.  

During a mark-up hearing for the Democrats’ budget reconciliation on September 13th, Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee voted against various amendments that would have prevented numerous convicted criminals and gang members from obtaining a green card and ultimately obtaining citizenship as part of an amnesty effort.

Democrats contested to an amendment that would have prevented illegal immigrant gang members from gaining amnesty as part of their budget reconciliation package.

The amendment in question sought that any prospective amnesty beneficiary “is not and has not been a member of a criminal street gang (as defined in subsection (a) of section 521 of title 18, United States Code), and has not participated in the activities of a criminal street gang knowing or having reason to know that such activities will promote, further, aid, or support the illegal activity of the criminal gang.

They also rejected an amendment that would have stopped the likes of illegal immigrant sex offenders from gaining any sort of immigration benefits.

The wording on that amendment voted against proposed that any prospective amnesty beneficiary “has not been convicted of any offense which required the alien to register on a sex offender registry, except in the case that such requirement resulted solely from urinating or defecating in public.”

Democrats also voted against two amendments that would have barred illegal immigrants with two or more DUI convictions and also with ten or more DUI convictions. House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler defended the votes against the DUI measures, saying the following during the meeting:

“Whether someone has to wear six or 10 or 20 convictions of DUI 30 years ago, someone could…change.

You may have any number of convictions for DUI — because you’re a drunk, because you’re an alcoholic — but you also may cease to be an alcoholic, and we all know people…who are no longer alcoholics and ought to be able to enjoy the benefits of the law.”

Again, Democrats defended illegal immigrants with criminal records, voting against an amendment that would have prevented those with weapons convictions from benefiting from any sort of amnesty effort.

The text from that amendment voted against read that any prospective amnesty beneficiary “does not have a single conviction for a misdemeanor offense relating to a firearm or destructive device (as defined in section 921 (a) of title 18, United States Code).

Democratic Rep. Zoe Lofgren acted as though these amendments presented by Republicans were somehow an affront non-criminal immigrants – despite these amendments being focused on actual convicted criminals:

“There was one amendment after another, extraneous amendments seeking to define immigrants as criminals and disease-ridden. It was really a disappointing discussion.”

However, this amnesty aspect that Democrats want pushed into the budget reconciliation still requires the sign-off from Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough – which she has yet to rule on whether it can be included.

MacDonough, a registered Independent, is an individual that rarely makes any headlines, but has become the talk of the town lately as her decision on whether Democrats can include immigration reform into a budget reconciliation measure.

As the Senate Parliamentarian, MacDonough is tasked with interpreting the rules of the upper chamber.

But again, Democrats could potentially still subvert MacDonough’s decision on the matter if she finds the immigration aspects of the budget reconciliation extraneous – but that would require an overruling via a simple Senate majority (with the help of Vice President Harris) – an action that hasn’t been done since 1975.

Do you want to join our private family of first responders and supporters?  Get unprecedented access to some of the most powerful stories that the media refuses to show you.  Proceeds get reinvested into having active, retired and wounded officers, their families and supporters tell more of these stories.  Click to check it out.

LET Unity

‘Madness’: Biden’s DHS may give work permits to Afghans before vetting them to even be here

(Originally published September 14th, 2021)

WASHINGTON, DC – The Biden administration’s fiscal year 2022 continuing resolution spending plan, quietly released Tuesday, reportedly includes a provision providing green cards to thousands of unvetted Afghan nationals settled in the United States, giving them refugee status and a waiver of terrorism as grounds for removal.

The majority of the 48,000 Afghans already settled in the United States do not qualify for Special Immigration Visas (SIVs) or refugee status. Instead, they have been provided “humanitarian parole” to enter the U.S. without being vetted through immigration.

In addition to the waiver of the terrorism disqualification, labeling visa-less Afghans as refugees will allow the administration to place them on welfare. The move would basically treat unqualified Afghans as refugees anyway.

A continuing resolution (CR) is required for the federal government to appropriate monies to various departments for the fiscal year, which runs from October 1 to Sept 30.

In the resolution, the Biden administration wrote:

“Without the anomaly, paroled individuals from Afghanistan would not be eligible for resettlement assistance, entitlement programs such as Medicaid and Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program food assistance, and other benefits.”

The continuing resolution is an appropriations bill and should not establish major policies or proposals, however it does permit adjustments. The Congressional Research Service explained:

“The duration and amount of funds in the CR, and purposes for which they may be used for specified activities, may be adjusted through anomalies.

“Anomalies may also designate a specific amount or rate of budget authority for certain accounts or activities that is different than the funding rate provided for the remainder of activities in the CR.”

Andrew “Art” Arthur, Resident Fellow in Law and Policy for the Center for Immigration Studies, wrote in a September 8 article for the Center:

“I was the acting chief of the former INS’s national security law division, and the staff director for the National Security Subcommittee at the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, so I know a few things about vetting aliens. It is an “exclusionary” system — it does not identify the “good guys”; at best, it can only hope to identify some of the bad ones.

“If you read the final report of the 9/11 Commission, you will see that vetting failures and a lack of intelligence sharing among U.S. intelligence and law-enforcement agencies were largely to blame for the fact that the 19 hijackers (all of whom were foreign nationals on various nonimmigrant visas) were in the United States to begin with.

“In the case of the Afghans being resettled in the United States who have minimal documentation and few if any ties to the U.S. government, that should be a red flag. The Biden CR compounds that.”

Arthur said there is a second red flag included in the resolution. There is a provision that allows the Department of Homeland Security to run a second background check on any Afghan citizen that receives the benefit:

“If the first background check were so good at spotting the bad guys, why would you need to run a second, third, or fourth one after you gave them cash and driver’s licenses?

To ask the question is to answer it: The Biden administration knows that its vetting of most Afghan refugees will be questionable, at best. But it gets worse.

That’s because one year after those aliens arrive here (not one year after the first background check is completed and they are given this special status), they would be eligible to apply for green cards.”

Arthur pointed out that under the proposal would allow the secretary of DHS to waive any requirement for “humanitarian purposes.” The message being sent to terrorists in Afghanistan is clear, according to Arthur:

“What message does that send to would-be terrorists in Afghanistan, or anywhere else for that matter? That you could have planted an IED, or blown up a school for girls, and if you make it to the United States, Alejandro Mayorkas is going to take you in his arms, tousle your hair, and say, “Come here you scamp, I am going to put you on a path to citizenship to make sure you and Mom aren’t separated?”

“Of course, if the secretary is not so forgiving, does that mean that some activist district court judge somewhere is not going to disagree?”

In conclusion, Arthur calls the Biden administration’s plan “madness”:

“The Afghan proposals in Biden’s CR are madness, given the fact that they provide a pathway to a green card, and soon thereafter citizenship, for Afghan nationals some of whom who are — past, present, or future — terrorists…

“… not to mention those who are child sex offenders or murderers. And, four days before the 20th anniversary of September 11th? The timing could not have been worse.”

_

Want to make sure you never miss a story from Law Enforcement Today?  With so much “stuff” happening in the world on social media, it’s easy for things to get lost.  

Facebook Follow First

Read the Full Article

FULL SHOW: Arizona Audit Haters Spread Disinformation Ahead Of Official Release
Cook Political Report Revises Virginia Governor’s Race to ‘Toss Up’ — Youngkin 'Seems to Have the Enthusiasm on His Side'

You might also like
Menu