According to an AP article, Rep. Nathan Deal has dropped legislation that would end birthright citizenship, the law that automatically grants citizenship to anyone born on U.S. soil. According to the article;
“Under Deal’s proposal, babies born in the U.S. would automatically have citizenship only if at least one of their parents is a U.S. citizen or national, a legal permanent resident of the U.S., or actively serving in the U.S. military.”
The U.S. Superme Court has given a lot of deference to Congress on immigration issues, even to the point that the court has upheld citizenship laws that favor one sex over another.
However, not even the bill’s sponsor gives it much of a chance of passing the House. Deal said, “I think the current makeup of the Congress is such that this will never get a hearing and will never be an issue that we get a chance to vote on, but I think it’s important to keep the issues that are part of the immigration problem alive.”
While I applaud Deal for making this stance, I only wish he had proposed this legislation during the period from 1995-2007 when the Republican Party controlled the House and there would have been a better shot of it passing. In fact, legislation like this might have softened the immigration reform debacle that helped cost the GOP control of Congress in the 2006 midterm elections.
You can read the full article in the AJC.
CORRECTION: Checking the press releases on his Congressional website, Deal did drop HR 1567 in the 108th Congress (2005-2007) which dealt with this issue in the wake of Bush’s immigration “reform” proposal.
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Yeah why would he have done that when it had a chance of passing and his contributors in the poultry and carpet industries would have gotten upset and not given him any more contributions to his campaign?
Hasn’t Nathan been pushing this bill for several years?
Checking his website, he did in 2006, but that was the only previous press release on the subject. The AP article didn’t say.
kcordell
That’s what I was thinking. He was pushing this back in 2006, or at least talking about it.
Deal should have been leading the illegal immigrations battle since he is from Gainesville, where it is a huge issue.
82,000 Latino registered voters [May 09] in Ga. Every vote counts when you are running for Gov.
Hall has 3651 H voters, yet is 25% hispanic [Census estimate] so of the ~~ 47,000 ………93% are too young to vote or illegal.
Maybe he’s just been too busy renaming post offices to work on this legislation earlier
I got an email from an elected official, who I won’t name, saying that Deal considered this his signature issue. I wish he had identified himself with it as well as Linder has the FairTax. Unfortunately, I consider myself in “the know” and this is a key issue for me as per immigration reform and I had no idea that Deal was working on this issue.
I think the bill is a great idea. Wish he had stuck it out. If I ever run for Congress, I think I will make it an issue! Haha!
I’m confused… is this an old bill that Deal is no longer pursuing, or a new bill that he is just now introducing? To me the headline “Deal drops bill” suggests the former… but Shep goes on to discuss it like hip-hop album that “drops” next Tuesday.
Either way… this bill is whack, yo.
This is not a new issue for Nathan Deal. I’ve heard him speaking about this for several years. I’ve heard him mention it 3 times since he announced for Governor. He should be praised for trying to close a loophole that is allowing thousands of people to gain citizenship by doing nothing more than being within our borders illegally when they’re delivered. Of course since you can’t deport a “citizen” the rest of the family stays too and more often than not at taxpayer expense.
Kudos Congressman Deal.
I’ve heard him speak of this idea but never heard it outside of his town hall meetings.
Why give up? If he doesn’t have the votes, he should be on TV and radio talking about this to inform everyone. Then he may win over some new congressmen or at least prove he can take the lead on something. I can look around Gainesville and tell you that nothing has been done to slow down illegal immigration and Mr. Deal lives here.
Jason – About Ox being the “Fair Tax” guy that is really a national issue not something the governor can change. Also, the Fair Tax organization never supports or indorses a candidate so how do they feel about Ox making stickers that give the impression that he is their guy?
First, we must do something.
Sadly, legislation is NOT the answer. As everyone will see, unlike some politicians, my thoughts and beliefs are consistent. I continually speak on the importance that our government abide by the rules set forth for it’s operation, The Constitution. The 14th amendment would supercede any such law.
“1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”
Now, as a Constitutional Scholar, I know this was NOT made for immigrants, it was made to make all slaves US citizens, which was certainly a great intent. But, from the 14th Amendment, the Supreme Court has determined somewhere in those quoted words it says women have a right to an abortion. If they can get abortion out of those words, I am sure they would interpret the first sentence at it’s literal meaning. If you are born here, you are a citizen.
It is these red herrings that irk me to no end, by both parties. The real solution to the problem is to either amend The Constitution to add the criteria of a parent being a citizen. (who pays for the paternity tests?) Or strike the 14th amendment. I am not advocating or dismissing either option, instead, I believe securing our borders, by most any means necessary, is the answer. If pregnant women cannot get in, we don’t have this problem. I am not completely against deporting families. I know the consequences of all of these foster children, but in reality, if we started the deportations, the incentive for the families to come in the first place is removed.
This is a very interesting idea!
From The Hill
….The Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors (DREAM) Act is a concept dear to Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin’s (D-Ill.) heart, and while health care reform may get this summer’s headlines in Washington, the DREAM Act may be a sleeper.
Introduced in the Senate on March 26 and co-sponsored by Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.), the DREAM Act has so far largely escaped notice. It would offer a path to U.S. citizenship for undocumented immigrant children who meet various criteria such as having lived in the U.S. for five years and completing classes at a U.S. high school. If accepted, applicants would obtain temporary citizenship for six years, during which they must obtain a two-year college degree or spend two years in military service to obtain permanent residency.
Currently, immigrant children can only obtain permanent residency through their parents, not independently….
http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/immigration-reform-could-emerge-again-in-the-fall-2009-05-25.html
Something needs to be done because ignoring it has put us in a worst position. I believe some people who came here illegally should be forced to leave, maybe not all but at least start with anyone who used any of our social services. If they came here illegally and got food stamps, medical care, housing, schooling or anything else that cost the American citizens money then they should be the first to go. If they came here and got a job and took care of themselves, they should be the first to stay and get a path to citizenship.
The sad thing is Congress doesn’t care what it cost or what we think. They only care about power and that is what put us where we are today, Broke.
Shepherd, you sound pretty desperate. Face it, your boy is toast…….
Deal did drop HR 1567 in the 108th Congress (2005-2007)
Oh, sorry, those Republicans in charge then were TOO concerned with inserting themselves into the Terri Schiavo incident and other things like the Bridge to Nowhere, the Highway Cup Runneth Over Spending Bills, and too much other crap.
Congressman Deal first introduced this bill on April 2, 2003, and has reintroduced it each Congress since: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d108:HR01567:@@@L&summ2=m&
For any legislative research, the best public site is THOMAS, which is a free service of the Library of Congress: http://thomas.loc.gov
I must admit that I am a little surprised that so many people who closely follow politics in Georgia have never heard of this legislation. Congressman Deal was able to get 104 cosponsors for this bill during the 110th Congress and 87 cosponsors during the 109th Congress. If you’ll browse through the other bills introduced in the House of Representatives, you’ll notice that this is well above average for cosponsorship.
However, I’m sure more people would be aware of this legislation if Congressman Deal would spend more of his time yelling at the evening “news anchors” via a split-screen shot on CNN, Fox, and MSNBC like some other members of Congress choose to do – but I get the impression that trying to yell over Chris Matthews or that SportsCenter reject Keith Olbermann isn’t his style. And frankly, that makes me like him more.
Here is a link to the bill in 110th Congress: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/D?d110:16:./temp/~bdag9x:@@@L&summ2=m&|/bss/d110query.html|
Steve, a bill expires at the end of the Congress so if it was not passed, he would have to drop a new bill in the next session of Congress (though he would not necessarily have to rewrite the language).
Jawga – With all the cosponsors, why didn’t it come up for a vote? I knew he had brought it up years ago but I never heard it was going anywhere. I thought it was a great bill. There is nothing wrong with going on TV and radio when you believe in a bill, which is different than “yelling at the evening “news anchors””.
Sometimes the media can help to inform people of a bill that they might not otherwise ever know about.
@Kellie:
I think the simple answer as to why the bill wasn’t brought before the whole House of Representatives was that the elected leadership of the majority party in Congress (Republicans from when Deal first introduced in 2003 through 2006 and the Democrats from 2007 until now) did not want the bill to come up for a vote. Under the rules of the House that require germaneness and a majority vote of the Rules Committee (which is tightly controlled by the leadership), Deal has not had an opportunity to bring the policy up for a vote in the House in the form of an amendment to a considered bill, and since the House Judiciary Committee has not favorably reported the bill and the Majority Leader has not scheduled the bill for a vote under a suspension of the rules, Congressman Deal has not been given a chance to get an up-or-down vote on the bill as stand-alone legislation.
I agree with your strong support of the bill. It’s a great bill and needed policy.
I think the bill would have passed both the House and Senate and been signed by the President if the Republican leadership would have simply allowed the bill to be brought up for a vote between 2003 and 2006. It’s just a shame that the Republican leadership in Congress let this opportunity slip through their fingers. I don’t know if they were too blind, too stupid, or too scared, but I firmly believe that they made a huge mistake.
Pursuant to your comments on getting Congressman Deal in front of the media more, I think that is something that needs to be brought up with Mr. Deal, his press secretary, or some member of his staff because I have long thought he should be more visible to people outside of his constituents and colleagues on Capitol Hill.
@Jason:
So, when are you going to update the article to reflect the fact that Congressman Deal has introduced this legislation every Congression since 2003?
Correcting my typo:
@Jason:
So, when are you going to update the article to reflect the fact that Congressman Deal has introduced this legislation every Congress since 2003?
I think you just did Jawga Dawg. I’m only going by what I saw on Deal’s own website. As I said, I applaud him for the effort, but I have never identified him with this issue. I could tell you Charlie Norwood’s key issue was the Patient’s Bill of Rights, Linder is known for the FairTax. Kingston has been the technology guru. I can’t identify Westmoreland, Gingrey or Price with any one issue and I never identified Deal with this being his “signature” issue. He may have made it known in the 9th, but he didn’t own it much outside of his district and I’m not going to sit here and pretend that he did.
This is a key issue in the immigration debate and we need Congressmen to stand up very vocally for this issue. I did a Google search on just news articles and it turned up 53 articles with a keyword search of “Nathan Deal” and “birthright.” I changed it to “Nathan Deal” and “immigration” and that returned 22 articles. A google news search of “Jason Shepherd” and “Republican” returned 11 articles.
In contract, there were 759 news articles that contained both the phrases “John Linder” and “Fair Tax.”
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