Check out the new look of our website!
Editor: Janine Hansen
Vol. 35 No. 3, email edition
State Strategy to Enforce Illegal Immigration Laws
Illegal aliens overburden our schools and hospitals. Criminal gangs coming across the border threaten our communities. Third world diseases have reemerged and our jobs are being lost to foreign workers who undercut the living wage. Our taxes continue to go up to pay for services for illegals. Americans are exceedingly frustrated by the federal government’s refusal to take action on the illegal immigration issue.
In January 2008, a coalition of organizations met in Carson City and developed a new strategy to address the refusal of the federal government to address illegal immigration. We plan to work to get state legislation passed, such as, Oklahoma’s and Arizona’s to address the illegal immigration issue in the Nevada State Legislature. You are essential in this effort. We all must lobby State Senators and Assemblymen before they are elected in 2008, by asking them to support, sponsor, or co-sponsor state legislation to enforce illegal immigration laws.
Nevada’s Attorney General’s office (AG Catherine Cortex Masto) has sided with the illegal aliens. Just last week her office issued an opinion which makes AB383, the legislation to address the illegal alien issue in Nevada, unenforceable. This flies in the face of the recent court decisions that upheld Arizona’s law, that denies business licenses to businesses, who hire illegals. See Las Vegas Sun article on the AG’s decision on AB383 included in this Newsletter.
You can contact the AG’s office and express your dismay at the decision by the Attorney General’s office declaring AB383 unenforceable by calling: 775-684-1100 or emailing aginfo@ag.state.nv.us
Eagle Forum identified AB383 as one of our top priorities in the 2007 Nevada Legislature. We sent out alerts, testified and lobbied in favor of this important legislation, which included all of the following items.
We have in hand new legislation prepared by the Immigration Reform Law Institute, which is in compliance with federal law and similar to Oklahoma’s illegal immigration law. This legislation can be adapted to Nevada law by the Legislative Council Bureau when submitted by a Legislator. A copy of this proposed legislation can be viewed on our website at http://nevadafamilies.org/Nevada Taxpayer and Citizen Protection2 of 2009.pdf Enclosed in this Newsletter is an analysis of this proposed legislation. I do think however that there were elements of Nevada’s AB383 that should be included in any new legislation.
Nevada Families Eagle Forum Newsletter is published 12 times a year. The Subscription price is $25.00.
Proposed Nevada Taxpayer and Citizenship Protection Act of 2009
This proposed Legislation was prepared by the Immigration Reform Law Institute. This summary was prepared by Janine Hansen, State President of Nevada Eagle Forum. To read complete bill visit: www.nevadafamilies.org
Section 101: Makes transportation, harboring or inducement of illegal aliens to reside in the state a felony. It establishes forfeiture of property including an aircraft, vehicle, or vessel used to transport illegal aliens. The provision is important because it counteracts the common argument that “illegal immigration is not a crime in our state.”
Section 102: Reproduces in state law the provisions of federal anti-sanctuary statutes. This would prohibit sanctuary laws to protect illegal aliens like the ones passed in cities across the nation. No local government can enact any ordinance or policy that limits or prohibits a law enforcement officer from communicating or cooperating with federal officials regarding the immigration status of any person within this state.
Section 103: Requires jailers to verify immigration status of foreign prisoners detained on DUI or felony charges. Local law enforcement agencies routinely detain more illegal aliens than the federal government.
Section 104: Requires the state to negotiate and implement a cooperative law enforcement agreement with U.S. Dept of Homeland Security to cross-designate trained state or local police officers as federal immigration enforcement officers, so that they can enforce federal law regarding illegal immigration.
Section 201: Requires public employers and contractors to verify employments status of new employees using the online E-Verify system. E-Verify is an Internet-based system operated by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) in partnership with the Social Security Administration.
Section 202: Requires state and local agencies to verify lawful status of applicants as a condition of eligibility for federal, state, and local public benefits through SAVE “Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements”. The SAVE Program enables federal, state, and local government agencies and licensing bureaus to obtain immigration status information. This section provides for criminal penalties for false statements and fraud.
Section 203: Requires businesses employing an independent contractor (IRS form 1099) to withhold tax from such income at the highest marginal rate unless work authorization of the contractor is verified. Most casual laborers are not considered to be independent contractors, so Section 203 would not apply to them.
Section 204: Restricts eligibility for all postsecondary education benefits, including scholarships, financial aid, enrollment in public institution degree programs, and resident tuition to persons lawfully present in US; grandfather clause protect currently enrolled illegal aliens.
Section 205: Makes compensation over $600 per year paid to unauthorized alien workers non-deductible for state tax purposes. Protects employers who have checked with E-Verify on status of worker. Broader version of Section 205 is for state’s, which have a state income tax so it does not apply to Nevada.
Section 301: Amends state civil rights law to make discharge of protected US workers while continuing to employ illegal aliens at the same job site or job classification a discriminatory practice; makes labor organizations who refer illegal aliens for employment jointly liable with employers. Creates safe harbor for employers and unions using E-Verify.
Section 302: Classifies employers subject to two or more compensation claims from illegal aliens in one year as “non-compliant employers.
Section 303: Makes employment by day laborers who lack employment authorization a misdemeanor.
Section 304: Restricts the operation of day labor hiring halls, immigrant worker education centers, etc., for illegal alien workers operated by taxpayer-funded or tax-exempt funds.
Section 401: Most states require that an applicant for a drivers’ license be a “resident” of the state. This section simply excludes persons who are not lawfully present in the U.S. from the definition of “resident.” It requires the state use the federal SAVE system to verify that a non-citizen applicant is not an ineligible alien.
Section 402: Similarly to Section 401, it restricts personal ID cards issued by the state to citizens or legal permanent immigrants. Uses the SAVE system.
Section 403: Declares English at the official language for state business.
Section 404: Illegal aliens frequently experience exploitation by members of their own linguistic communities who purport to provide advice and assistance to remain in the U.S. This section restricts provision of immigration legal advice to licensed attorneys.
Section 405: (working concept) Makes acceptance of an Individual Taxpayer Identity Number (ITIN) for purposes not authorized by the US Treasury Dept. or IRS a state misdemeanor.
Section 501: (working concept) Creates a Commission on Population Growth Impacts to study domestic and foreign sources of population growth and provides recommendation on economic, environmental, and land use impacts. In most states population growth is mostly driven by mass immigration.
An almost 6-month-old state law that calls for fining businesses employing illegal immigrants can’t be enforced, an official said Friday.
The reason: The state attorney general’s office says immigration is an issue for the federal government, not states. The law, AB 383, mostly focuses on combatting the trafficking of immigrants, but includes a provision for the Taxation Department to fine employers whom the federal government has proved were knowingly hiring undocumented workers.
The law took effect Oct. 1. Dino DiCianno, executive director of the Taxation Department, wrote the state attorney general Sept. 6, asking whether federal law preempted the provision. On March 3, Senior Deputy Attorney General Karen Dickerson replied that federal immigration law “expressly preempts state and local laws which impose criminal or civil sanctions on employers who hire illegal immigrants, except through licensing and similar laws.”
The result: “The letter of the law (AB 383) as written cannot be carried out,” DiCianno said.
“I don’t know where this leaves us now,” he added.
Peter Ashman, a local immigration attorney and former chairman of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, Nevada chapter, called the attorney general’s opinion “the right decision.”
Enforcing immigration laws should be left to federal immigration officials, he said, adding that the measure, a first for Nevada, “reflects the frustration of state and local governments nationwide ... as they’re trying to fill a gap.”
The provision’s story mirrors those of thousands of ordinances and laws on immigration nationwide: Constituents voice concerns about immigration and lawmakers move legislation forward with relatively little opposition, only to have an attorney general or outside lawsuits strike down the laws.
According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, 1,562 state bills on immigration were introduced in 2007 and 240 became law. Laws in Pennsylvania and Oklahoma have faced high-profile legal challenges.
Arizona is a notable exception. Its law allowing the state to take away the business licenses of employers who knowingly hire undocumented workers recently survived a challenge in federal court.
David Thronson, a founder of the immigration law clinic at UNLV’s Boyd School of Law, said, “There is great political will to pass these bills regardless of whether they’ll take effect.” His students helped draft the part of AB 383 addressing immigrant trafficking.
“Whether they’re enforceable or not, these laws speak to issues that motivate voters,” Thronson said.
The bill’s sponsor, Assemblywoman Marilyn Kirkpatrick, D-North Las Vegas, said AB 383 was “very important” to her and her constituents. She pointed to another provision that ordered the Business and Industry Department to post a link on its Web site to E-Verify, the federal government’s tool for verifying the Social Security numbers of workers.
“Our philosophy was there’s got to be tools to verify Social Security numbers, and there’s got to be ramifications,” she said.
Kirkpatrick said she wouldn’t comment further until she saw the attorney general’s opinion.
For now, the ramifications or consequences of hiring illegal immigrants will be left to the federal government.
DiCianno said he would still forward any complaints about undocumented workers to the state attorney general. He intends to speak with the Legislative Counsel Bureau to determine what the next steps will be.
“Until I have that conversation, I’m not going to move forward. We need to do what’s legally defensible and appropriate,” he said.
Assemblyman Moises Denis, D-Las Vegas, one of three Hispanics in the Legislature, said he supported the bill, which passed unanimously in the House and Senate, because he thought the “provisions for trafficking were useful.” He said he wasn’t sure at the time whether the provision aimed at employers would work and he intends to look more closely at such provisions in the future.
“In any case,” Denis added, “I have thought all along that the true solution to the problem lies in comprehensive immigration reform by the federal government.”
Hear DR. JEROME CORSI on the NORTH AMERICAN UNION
Dr Jerome Corsi, the leading expert on the North American Union—the coming merger with Mexico and Canada will be our special guest speaker. In his latest best selling book, The Late Great USA, Dr. Corsi proves that the benignly-named “Security and Prosperity Partnership,” created at a meeting between George W. Bush, Paul Martin of Canada and Vincente Fox of Mexico, is in fact the same kind of integration plan that led to the European Union. American Sovereignty is in jeopardy. This deception of the North American Union is the key reason the federal government has refused to stop the flood of illegals across our open and undefended U.S. borders. Dr. Corsi has ‘connected the dots’ between the Security and Prosperity Partnership, the NAFTA Superhighway, proposals for a North American Union and the open borders between Mexico, the US, and Canada.
Dinner with Dr. Jerome Corsi
Friday, May 2, 2008, 5:30pm: $50 per person in by April advance
At the Grand Sierra Resort in Reno, Nevada
Public meeting with Dr. Jerome Corsi
Friday, May 2, 2008, 7:30pm: $5 per person at the door:
At the Grand Sierra Resort in Reno, Nevada
For further information: contact Lynn Chapman 775-356-0105, Janine Hansen 775-397-6859
This event is sponsored by the Independent American Party and is part of their State Convention. Guests are welcome.
We have been updating our email list. If you are not receiving emails, please send us your new email.
___Yes, I will contribute at this time ___$10 ___$25 ___$50 ___$100 ___$500 ___$1000 other $_____
___Yes, I will contribute monthly ___$10 ___$25 ___$50 ___$100 ___$500 ___$1000 other $_____
Name_________________________________Address_________________________________
City_________________________State_________________Zip_________________________
Phone__________________Fax__________________E-mail____________________________
For E-mail Alerts and Updates.
Please make checks payable to Nevada Eagle Forum, not tax deductible, or Nevada Families (Division of WPA), tax deductible, 186 Ryndon Unit 12, Elko, NV 89801, 775-397-6859, Fax 775-753-9118 director@nevadafamilies.org