Swor+HB+266

HB 266 for Swor Texas House Bill 266, from here on out known as HB 266, was written by Republican Leo Berman, Flynn and Bonnen. It was co-authored by Betty Brown, Christian, Elkins, Fletcher, Jim Jackson, Phil King, and Parkera. The bill has come under some controversy, mostly from the Latino population, building industry and the Social Workers Union. HB 266 addresses “regulating the provision of benefits and services to, and the verification of the employment status of, immigrants and to enforcing laws relating to immigrants; providing civil and criminal penalties.”

Article one addresses the impact that immigration is having on the public. Illegal immigration causes economic hardship and has increased crime in the state of Texas. This behavior is encouraged when state agencies provide benefits without verifying a person’s immigration status. Issuing an identification card without verifying immigration status encourages the harboring of illegal’s and encourages illegal’s to stay and reside in Texas. This alone hampers the enforcement of federal immigration laws, decreases the security of our borders and restricts the privileges of legal residents. In fact, a 2009 Pew Hispanic Center study revealed that Hispanics account for 40% of all sentenced federal offenders which is more than triple the Hispanic population of 13%.

Section 1.02 states, “The legislature declares that it is a compelling public interest of this state to discourage illegal immigration by requiring each agency of this state and of a political subdivision of this state to cooperate fully with federal immigration authorities in enforcing federal immigration laws, and that additional actions are necessary to ensure the integrity of the governmental programs and services in this state.”

Article two would require the participation in a work eligibility status verification system and addresses unlawful employment practices. The status verification system to be adopted would be electronic and ran through the federal government. Current legislation exists to verify work authorization through Section 403 (a) of the Federal Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996. This is currently run by the Department of Homeland Security and is known as E-Verify.

This section also addresses contractors who hire illegals. It will prevent the government from entering into any contract with a contractor unless registered and participating in the verification system. It also addresses the sub-contractors and states they also must participate in the program in order to obtain government contracts. Of course the bill is opposed by ABC (Associated Builders and Contractors) of Texas, and TEIR (Texas Employers for Immigration Reform. Since Texas has a large building industry with cheap labor force of illegal immigrants, these organizations are opposed to losing the labor force. They state their objection being that there is nothing in place that would protect an employer who “made an honest mistake.”

Section three addresses public benefits obtained by illegal aliens. The bill states that unless a person is here lawfully, they are not considered a state resident in regards to state educational benefits. If not here legally they would not be able to receive the benefit of “in-state” tuition, a scholarship or financial aid for attending a public or private higher education institute. The bill states that the Texas Higher Education Board must adopt rules and plans in order to fulfill this duty. To determine resident status the person would need to provide a statement of dates and length of time they have resided in Texas, that the purpose of being in Texas was to obtain a domicile, they may have a statement from their parents stating dates and length of time in Texas. This would be waived if the person is a United States citizen, immigrant here lawfully or has filed a petition with Immigration to legalize their immigration status.  This section of the bill has come under attack for limiting the education of immigrants. However, the bill does not completely prohibit illegal immigrants from going to college. There are guidelines in place that allow for certain immigrants that have been here for varying amounts of time that would allow them to be eligible for benefits. In addition, they have the opportunity to petition after being enrolled in school for a certain amount of time. I could also understand this opposition if illegal’s were knocking down doors for a higher education, but they are not. In fact, only 68% of Hispanics actually graduate from high school. Currently they can receive all the benefits they want and more and only 42.5 % in 2007 who graduated high school actually enrolled in an institute of higher education. This is compared to 43.5% of blacks and 57.5% of white graduates.

Subtitle H of section three then begins by addressing public benefits by state and local governments. It states that the government entity must verify that anyone over age 14 be lawfully present in the United States. It provides provisions for the applicant to prove immigration status and even provides free notary service to those that need to utilize this step of the process. Once again, the bill comes under attack as denying healthcare to “innocent children.” Once again, the bill does not state that individuals younger than 14 prove immigration status, allows for immigration status verification to be exempt if it is a healthcare item or service that is an emergency, is not related to an organ transplant, if short-term, noncash, emergency; for immunizations or for testing of a communicable disease. It also allows exemption for crisis counseling and intervention, short-term shelter, soup kitchen and the like.

Now I would like to personally address this “entitlement” to benefits. I am a United States citizen, yet unless I have the ability to take off from work, sit in a government office for hours on end, learn “the system” I am not eligible for benefits. Yet, people who are here illegally, which is a crime in itself, are allowed to be a sump pump and drain our economy dry. An example of the cost of immigration on the United States can be reviewed in “The Fiscal Cost of Low-Skilled Households to the U.S. Taxpayer.” In this enlightening research study Robert Rector, a senior research fellow in Domestic Studies, studied 17.7 million American households of people without a high school degree. Rector chose low-skilled workers because it is estimated that almost two-thirds of illegal immigrants fall into this category. He researched the numbers via the Census Board, the Congressional Research Service, the Bureau of Labor Statistics and some other governmental agencies. He reviewed the income of the people, what they spent and the amount of government services received.

After review of his data he concluded that the average low-skill household collected $22,449 in benefits (that is after deducting $9,689 that they pay in taxes). In conclusion, you can then take $22,449 and multiply it by 17.7 million low-skilled households in 2004 and the total cost to the taxpayer in 2004 was $397 billion. He estimates that you can take that amount and look at the cost in ten years as $3.9 trillion dollars in money taken away from the United States and the taxpayers. So, for the average life span of 50 years each low-skilled worker will cost the taxpayer $1.1 million over the course of their life time.

Section four of the bill will make it a criminal offense if they knowingly falsify a statement or affidavit to clarify immigration status. It provides for sheriff’s to verify status if they are arresting someone for a felony or “intoxication offense.” The state will need to form a “Fraudulent Identification Unit” and provide sufficient personal to maintain the unit.

The goal is to make this bill law September 1, 2009. From the information that I have been able to gather, it does not appear that it has been accepted into law as of yet.

Resources: www.abchouston.org/Files/LegUpdate13March09.pdf http://newsletter.county.org/tac/issues/2009-03-31/7.html http://www.qando.net/?p=3680 http://newsletter.county.org/tac/issues/2009-03-31/7.html http://www.naswtx.org/displaycommon.cfm?an=1&subarticlenbr=78 - http://www.morrisonreport.com/fax_test/index.php?faxID=62 http://www.ircot.com/news_long.htm