Plan Will End Drain On Nation’s Funds Pro-Initiative Illegal Aliens Shouldn’t Be Rewarded With Our Privileges

Fri., May 26, 1995

By D.F. Oliveria daveo@spokesman.com (509) 319-0354

It’s tough for a country of immigrants to say to others yearning for our freedoms, “No more.” But tough decisions are necessary as we get serious about balanced budgets at all levels of government.

We can’t continue to provide even limited welfare for illegal aliens when dwindling revenue is forcing us to tighten benefit restrictions for our own poor. We can’t provide health care for illegal aliens when many struggling Americans can’t afford basic medical services. We can’t school the children of illegal aliens when our schools are jammed and performance is down.

Finally, we can’t keep our borders unofficially open without being overwhelmed by immigrants from Mexico, Cuba, Haiti and other impoverished nations. We can’t absorb the impact financially or culturally.

Washington’s Initiative 653 - patterned after California’s successful 1994 Proposition 187 - has flaws (teachers and doctors, for example, shouldn’t be involved in fingering illegal aliens). But it’s also laced with common sense. The measure would declare illegal aliens ineligible for state-funded public health services, welfare programs and education.

In an unsuccessful try to defeat California’s Prop 187, opponents conjured the bogeyman of racism and spent $4.5 million - 13 times as much as supporters. The measure passed overwhelmingly, despite opposition from every major political candidate but the governor, because traditionally generous America is tired of being the world’s Sugar Daddy.

Interestingly, a 1993 Field poll found that 64 percent of Mexican-American citizens in California viewed illegal aliens as a serious problem. And a 1994 Dallas Morning News poll concurred, finding that 69 percent of Hispanic Texans favored increased border patrol to cut off the flow of illegal aliens, 55 percent supported the basic concepts of Prop. 187.

The operative word in this whole debate is “illegal.” Foreigners who have circumvented our immigration law shouldn’t be rewarded with our privileges.

Indeed, many illegal aliens have become solid, contributing citizens during 30 years of lax immigration enforcement. But disproportionately they also have landed on welfare and driven up crime rates.

It’s time to stem the tide.

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