State Sen. Ricardo Lara, D-Bell Gardens, is renewing his push to reform health care in California, this time proposing new legislation to cover illegal immigrants’ health care.

“Two years ago we passed #Health4All children in California & now the Senate is fighting to cover our seniors in the CA budget. #Health4AllElders is the answer to every child who asked: What about my grandfather? What about my abuela? They deserve to age with dignity and security,” Lara tweeted to promote the bill.

While Lara originally intended to have the bill cover all undocumented immigrants, the bill was reportedly amended in the Senate appropriations process. It now covers minors up to 19 and undocumented adults 65 years and older. 

Currently, most illegal immigrants in the state rely on emergency rooms for care – a reality that drives up health care costs for everyone in the state, supporters of the bill argue.

Lara, who’s currently running for insurance commissioner in Tuesday’s primary, has taken several steps in defiance of the Trump agenda, putting himself at the center of the so-called “resistance” – like his failed efforts to pass a universal health care bill last year.

More broadly, it comes at a time of rising health care costs in the Golden State, with about 60 percent of the state’s uninsured being those here illegally.

“It has been 32 years since Congress last passed comprehensive immigration reform for those already living in the U.S., and their failure should not fall on our elders’ shoulders,” Lara added in a press release. “Dysfunction in Washington and Trump’s constant attacks on immigrants should not distract California from doing the right thing and extend health care to those who have given so much to our state.”

And in the Assembly, a similar bill has passed. Introduced by Democratic State Assemblyman Dr. Joaquin Arambula, that legislation expands the Medi-Cal program to cover undocumented young adults up to age 26.

“The Medi-Cal program is, in part, governed and funded by federal Medicaid program provisions,” Assembly Bill 2965 reads. “The federal Medicaid program prohibits payment to a state for medical assistance furnished to an alien who is not lawfully admitted for permanent residence or otherwise permanently residing in the United States under color of law.”

Offering such coverage would cost the state around $3 billion next year, according to California’s Legislative Analyst’s Office.

However, the bill comes with the risk of heavy political blowback, with Republicans in the state already energized in opposition to California’s sanctuary state law and the gas tax heading into the November elections.

“It’s another freebie given by an out-of-control Legislature,” GOP gubernatorial candidate John Cox recently said on Fox News about the policy. “We’re a compassionate society but there’s a limit on what we can afford to do.”

The most expensive contest on the 2014 California ballot is set to return next year. 

“Marshall Tuck, who unsuccessfully challenged incumbent schools chief Tom Torlakson in a contentious 2014 race that became a proxy fight over a lawsuit on teacher job protections, will run again for state superintendent of public instruction,” the Sacramento Bee reported. “The former Los Angeles schools executive on Monday announced his candidacy for the 2018 election, citing a desire to bring ‘big change’ to a public education system that has ‘settled for mediocrity.'”

The two tangled last time on opposite sides of many Californians’ sense that teachers unions had often become an obstacle to improving education quality statewide. “They split over the Vergara court decision that held teacher-tenure protections discriminated against poor and minority students,” as CalWatchdog recalled previously. “Torlakson took the side of the unions and supported the appeal; Tuck made sustaining the decision a keystone of his campaign.”

“After Torlakson beat Tuck in a close election, 52 percent to 48 percent, Democrats hoped to unite on education and put their divisiveness behind them. But UC’s tuition hikes reopened the wound, putting officeholders in an awkward political position and pushing instinctively liberal students to oppose policies set by Democrats.”

Shifting agendas

Now, Tuck’s plans have focused around budget oversight and teacher quality. In his campaign announcement, “Tuck said his campaign will focus on ensuring that Gov. Jerry Brown’s new school funding formula – which provides additional money to districts with large numbers of poor children, English learners and foster youth – is really funneling money to the neediest students and that its accountability measures are more understandable for parents and the public,” the Bee noted.

“He also said California’s efforts to address its teacher shortage ‘so far have been way too small.’ He would consider raising compensation and changing training programs to get more potential teachers into the profession.”

More conciliatory

The rhetoric reflected a desire to stake out reform territory that would not prove as bitterly divisive as in 2014. “Tuck, 43, said he continues to favor revising the state’s tenure law, granting due process rights in less than two years, and revising the state’s teacher evaluation system,” according to EdSource. “But the issues of overriding importance, he said, are the need to establish ‘phenomenal’ training and mentoring programs for principals and new teachers and ‘for more support for students with the greatest needs.’ There was an overemphasis in the last campaign on the 10 percent of the issues that were divisive and less on the other 90 percent, he said.”

Tuck’s words also worked to calibrate expectations to the reality of the superintendency. “The position has little direct authority over California’s schools, but Tuck said he would use it to set a direction for the governor, State Board of Education and Legislature,” the Los Angeles Times reported. “Tuck previously led Green Dot Public Schools, a Los Angeles-based independent charter school chain that operates with a teachers union contract, and the Partnership for Los Angeles Schools, a school turnaround organization. He has spent the last two years working as an educator in residence at the New Teacher Center.”

Torlakson’s own time has been consumed of late with education issues affecting undocumented residents. He recently “urged the state’s immigrant students not to be fearful of applying for the California Dream Act, a college financial aid program dedicated to helping undocumented students attend state universities and community colleges,” according to the San Jose Mercury News. “As of last Friday, the number of California Dream Act applications has declined by 42 percent this year, due to President Trump-spurred unease over possible deportations, according to the California Student Aid Commission, which receives applications from students.”

The popular Democratic governor echoed other Democratic leaders in the state by taking shots at Republican President Donald Trump and congressional Republicans and their proposed, yet sometimes vague, agenda.

On the day Trump pushed through two controversial oil projects opposed by environmentalists, with a repeal of the Affordable Care Act slowly working through Congress and with federal action on immigration looming on the horizon, Brown pointed to the battle lines drawn between the state and the federal government.

“While no one knows what the new leaders will actually do, there are signs that are disturbing,” Brown said. “We have seen the bald assertion of ‘alternative facts.’ We have heard the blatant attacks on science. Familiar signposts of our democracy – truth, civility, working together – have been obscured or swept aside.”

Yet the tone wasn’t entirely combative, compared to legislative leaders. Brown lauded Trump’s plans for massive investment in infrastructure (“Amen to that, brother”) and highlighted bipartisan accomplishments in the state, like the creation of the rainy-day fund and the water bond.

Brown also drew a stark contrast with Hillary Clinton, who, during the campaign season, referred to half of Trump’s supporters as a “basket of deplorables.” 

“Democrats are in the majority, but Republicans represent real Californians too,” Brown said. “We went beyond party when we reformed workers’ compensation, when we created a rainy-day fund and when we passed the water bond.”

Brown lauded accomplishments during his governorship, which included increasing education funding, passing climate-change legislation, removing a substantial budget deficit and adding millions of people to insurance plans through both Medi-Cal and private policies.

A significant portion of the speech was devoted to immigration, noting immigrants are “an integral part of who we are and what we’ve become.” Brown called attention to some of the state’s immigration initiatives, like the Trust Act and a measure issuing driver licenses to undocumented immigrants, saying “we may be called to defend those laws and defend we will.”

“Whether it’s the threat to our budget, or to undocumented Californians, or to our efforts to combat climate change – or even more global threats such as a financial meltdown or a nuclear incident or terrorist attack – this is a time which calls out for courage and for perseverance,” Brown said. “I promise you both.”

On several fronts, California Democrats have used the tail end of this political season to push for advances on their health care agenda — with mixed results. 

In Sacramento, they succeeded in passing legislation targeting health care cost sticker-shock after several recent misfires. “The unexpected charges come when patients are treated by an out-of-network provider at an in-network facility,” NPR explained. “After several failed attempts in recent years, the California legislature last week passed Assembly Bill 72, which aims to protect patients’ pocketbooks when they’re hit by these surprise bills. Gov. Jerry Brown has until the end of September to sign or veto the legislation. He is expected to sign it into law.”

“A 2015 Consumers Union survey suggests the surprise bill phenomenon is fairly common,” the station added. “It found nearly 1 in 4 Californians who’d had hospital visits or surgery in the prior two years reported receiving an unexpected bill from an out-of-network provider.”

Waiver wanted

In Washington, D.C., meanwhile, a who’s who of members of Congress hailing from California tried to flex their muscle around California’s unlikely request that the federal government allow unlawful and undocumented immigrants in state to access health benefits under Obamacare. “In a letter announced Wednesday, 37 members of California’s congressional delegation asked Treasury Secretary Jack Lew and Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Burwell to accept California’s request for a waiver that would allow the state to offer health care to an estimated 50,000 undocumented immigrants,” TPM reported. 

“The letter is just the latest in the fight to expand health care coverage to California’s undocumented population. In June, California Gov. Jerry Brown signed a bill passed by the state’s Legislature that allowed California’s undocumented population to buy their own health insurance on the state’s exchange, Covered California. However, a special federal waiver — a 1332 waiver — is needed before the state is allowed to enact its law.”

It hasn’t been clear whether President Obama could be moved to take action before the end of his term in office. He has already wound up under immense personal pressure to convince insurers to remain committed to the Affordable Care Act’s health care exchanges, despite a growing sense in industry that doing so will be harmful.

Unaffordable care

“With no lifeline coming from the divided Congress, Obama and his administration are redoubling their pleas for insurers to shore up the federal health care law and pushing uninsured Americans — especially younger ones — to sign up for coverage,” Politico observed. “The administration is nervously preparing for its final Obamacare open-enrollment season just a week before Election Day, amid a cascade of headlines about rising premiums, fleeing insurers and narrowing insurance options.”

“But six years after passage of Obama’s signature domestic achievement, the litany of woes afflicting the Obamacare marketplaces is formidable. Enrollment has plateaued at half of what was projected. Three major insurers have largely quit, citing big losses. Double-digit rate hikes are the norm for plans across the country. And roughly one in five Americans may find just one insurer selling plans in their area when they shop for 2017 coverage.”

At the same time, although California’s exchange program has been one of the biggest relative success stories for the ACA, the state’s health cost burden has continued to rise over time. A new study released by the University of California Los Angeles Center for Health Policy Research revealed that “spending is projected to total more than $367.5 billion in 2016, with about 71 percent covered by public funds when additional resources such as the Affordable Care Act subsidies and county spending are included,” according to U-T San Diego.

Indeed, California Democrats pushing the White House used the problem as ammunition for their own waiver goal, arguing before the press “that denying undocumented immigrants health care was only driving up the long-term costs of health care,” as TPM recalled. “Without insurance coverage, many immigrants have been forced to depend on emergency services to be treated.”

Similar programs have been introduced in nine other states and the District of Columbia.

Originally introduced by Assemblyman Luis Alejo, D-Watsonville, the bill to issue driver’s licenses regardless of legal immigration status was passed into law in 2013. Assembly Bill 60, the Safe and Responsible Driver Act, permitted the expansion to take effect on the first day of 2015.

As the law specified, recipients did not get licenses identical to those possessed by U.S. citizens. Thanks to the requirements of federal law, the special licenses differed in their visual appearance by being marked, “FEDERAL LIMITS APPLY.” They cannot be used for specified purposes like entering restricted federal areas.

Now, with the process established by the law well under way, Alejo began urging Californians to help eligible recipients take advantage of the program. There, he said, the key is ensuring interested participants actually pass the driving exam.

“It took us 20 years to pass this law in Sacramento, and now that it is a reality, it is up to all our community, not just the legislators, not just the DMV but also organizations in our communities, to take it seriously and put aside the time to study the books, and be able to pass those tests,” he said.

As the Californian reported, in January, “The statewide written knowledge exam passage rate for all applicants for a new driver’s license was 48 percent, including AB60 applicants” — an increase of 1 percentage point over the Jan. 2014 results.

Outsized demand

But other requirements and hurdles kept licenses out of the hands of many undocumented immigrants who wanted them. “Altogether, about 387,000 undocumented immigrants applied for licenses during the first two months of the program, the state said, but only 131,000 were granted them,” according to Reuters. “Immigrants applying for the licenses must still prove their identities with birth certificates or other means,” in addition to passing the driver’s test.

The flood of demand has reflected a growing sense statewide that beneficiaries simply won’t be subject to increased scrutiny at the federal level. Activists in the legal field have adopted a wait-and-see approach.

“The DMV has said they will not refer these cases to law enforcement as long as the person used the license for driving purposes only and did not commit any other criminal activity,” said one San Francisco attorney at the Asian Law Caucus. “We have not yet seen how this policy is playing out, so we are advising people to use caution.”

More organs

Although the licensing program has divided voters in California, where the issue of undocumented immigrants remains sharply unpopular among many residents, beneficiaries of AB60 have scored a public relations coup of sorts thanks to an unanticipated development: increased rates of organ donation.

As the Fresno Bee reported, the California Transplant Donor Network reasoned the law spurred an increase of some 30 percent:

“From Jan. 2 to March 3, 56,000 people signed up as organ donors, according to the donor network, the only federally designated organ recovery organization in Northern and Central California and Northern Nevada.

“‘It’s got to be more than a coincidence that in the past three months — since AB60 took effect — so many people were added to the donor registry, said spokesman Anthony Borders. ‘It’s the only spike that’s happened in the last few years.'”

Although analysts have not yet connected all the dots, some accounts suggested Latinos who immigrated illegally have benefited from clear religious support in opting to donate.

“Recent popes have spoken in favor of organ donations,” the Orange County Register reported. “Pope Benedict XVI was a card-holding organ donor until he became pope, according to the Catholic News Agency. More recently, Pope Francis described organ donations as ‘a testimony of love for our neighbor.'”

Francis is the first pope from Latin America.

AB 60 by Assemblyman Luis Alejo, D-Salinas, will grant drivers licenses to everyone who can pass the tests required by the Department of Motor Vehicles, regardless of their immigration status.

The DMV-issued driver's license will have an identifying mark on the card so it cannot be used for voter identification.

And that identifying mark is the sticking point.

Many immigrant groups and labor unions opposed AB 60, but there was nothing in the media about this opposition.

“AB 60 will have a recognizable mark on the front of the license, and the back will read: 'this card in not acceptable for federal purposes; it is acceptable for driving purposes only,” a joint memo from 10 labor unions said. The California Rural Legal Assistance Foundation, SEIU, Asian Americans For Civil Rights and Equality, ACLU, California Nurses Association, Mexican American Legal Defense and Legal Fund,  California Teamsters Public Affairs Council, California Professional Firefighters, and The United Farm Workers signed the opposition memo.

The labor unions objected to the identifying mark on the ID, because it would “single out undocumented members of the community.”

The unions are right.

The identification card will also end up requiring drivers to carry auto insurance, in a de-facto way.

Once this information gets out, I don't think there will be any great rush by undocumented immigrants to get a card which clearly identifies them as in the country illegally.

Advocates for immigrant groups have pushed for the driver's license and insisted it is necessary so immigrants in the country illegally can drive without the constant fear of being pulled over for a traffic violation, and end up getting deported.

This may be, but the insurance requirement could be a problem when immigrants are pulled over for a traffic violation.

Alejo released this statement:

“I am proud to have authored a historic measure for the state of California. I want to commend the Governor for understanding the reality faced by 1.4 million unlicensed drivers who have waited for nearly two decades to have an opportunity to drive to work without fear,” Alejo said. “With AB 60 we are recognizing the needs of many hard-working immigrants living here and contributing so much to our great state. Immigrants who drive legally are more likely to work, spend and contribute to the economy. And those with driver's licenses will have more job opportunities available to them, which will boost businesses in the state.”

During committee hearings on AB 60, Alejo testified how so many illegal immigrants are forced to drive cheap cars because of the constant threat of being impounded by the police.

“This bill will enable millions of people to get to work safely and legally,” Gov. Brown said in a statement in September, after the Legislature passed AB 60. “Hopefully, it will send a message to Washington that immigration reform is long past due.”

This is an issue in which Gov. Brown and I can agree, but we may not agree on how.

By Katy Grimes

SACRAMENTO — At a Capitol hearing Wednesday, Assemblyman Roger Hernandez, D-West Covina, charged that California employers frequently threaten immigrant workers with deportation and abuse.

The Assembly Labor and Employment Committee hearing took place after a press conference and announcement of a new bill by Hernandez, AB 263. The bill will include stiff new labor laws aimed at abusive employers who retaliate against undocumented workers by calling the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency federal agents to arrest the undocumented workers.

The “abuse and exploitation” is made worse by “the added injustice of intimidation based on immigration status,” Hernandez said. “I, for one, am not content to stand by and wait for the federal government to do its job.”

State’s role not covered

But what wasn’t covered at the hearing is the lead role the state of California itself takes in controlling the lives of undocumented day laborers. California law allows state-licensed farm labor contractors total control over the wages and pay, and even transportation and housing of documented and undocumented agricultural workers.

Will the state of California and lawmakers go after their own flawed policies and laws? It appears that, while lawmakers and special-interest groups blame unscrupulous employers, it is the lawmakers themselves who have facilitated the biggest illegal immigration racket in the country, and hijacked the process in the path to citizenship by undocumented immigrants.

The incomplete hearing

The hearing centered around the question, “Is California doing enough to protect immigrant workers from retaliation and other abuses?”

The bulk of the hearing was devoted to testimony about extreme employer retaliation against undocumented workers. The National Employment Law Project, a nonprofit group based in Washington, D.C. and Oakland, Calif., whose partners include “worker centers and unions, immigrant rights groups, progressive lawyers, and community organizations,” led the hearing.

“Employers and their agents have far too frequently shown that they will use immigration status as a tool against labor organizing campaigns and worker claims,” said the executive summary of a new report just published by the group.

“Our model is to develop and test new policies at the state and local level, then scale them up to spur change at the national level,” the project said on its website. “We partner with strong advocacy networks, grounded in the full range of stakeholders — grassroots groups and national organizations, worker centers and unions, policymakers and think tanks.”

The group claims:

“Globalization has combined with domestic policy choices to yield an economy that creates too many low-wage jobs and not nearly enough good ones. Lax enforcement of workers’ rights, increased subcontracting and misclassification of employees as independent contractors, and failed immigration policies have heightened insecurity for all workers. Inequality has grown to historic levels, the middle class is imperiled, and many fear our best days are behind us.”

The report found the weak labor market, with high unemployment, gives employers a tremendous advantage over people vying for scarce jobs. “This imbalance gives employers great power to set the terms and conditions of employment and to violate workers’ rights without fear of consequences.”

But several of the hearing speakers admitted that California already has labor laws in place to remedy these injustices. The laws just aren’t enforced.

Extreme cases

Betty Hung of the Asian Pacific Legal Center, named as a source in the report, recounted the 2012 story of a Thai immigrant working as a restaurant delivery driver. He worked 11-hour days, five days a week, for a flat daily rate of $60. The driver finally reported to labor officials that he did not receive overtime pay, or any breaks during his workday.

Hung said the U.S. Labor Department ordered the driver’s employer to pay $23,000 in hourly wages and mileage expenses. But, in a retaliatory move, the employer then told the delivery driver he had to repay the money, and threatened to have him deported.

Similar stories were heard throughout the hearing.

The right to work under a contract

Hernandez and Democratic legislators called for Congress and President Barack Obama to pass a comprehensive immigration reform package, including a path toward citizenship for the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants in the United States.

Together with Hernandez’s legislation, the apparent goal is to be the first state in the country with the toughest laws aimed directly at employers.

“My children have a better life than my father had,” Ashley Alvarado told the committee. She is the president of the Teamsters Cannery Council, located in Visalia, Calif. “Everybody has the right to this, and to work under a contract.”

Alvarado named the Marquez Brothers as employers who regularly retaliate against undocumented immigrant workers. “It’s why the Marquez Brothers send their lawyers,” she said, as she gestured to the back of the hearing room. “I command you to stand up to the Marquez Brothers tortilla factory, which hides incentives, and doesn’t pay taxes. They are cheating us from much needed revenue, and getting rich by cheating our government,” Alvarado said. “Workers should not have to live in fear.”

Her command was echoed by Hung. “You can make history,” Hung told the committee. “Your leadership can set the tone for Congress.”

State licenses

But according to a source I spoke with who worked as an agriculture day laborer at age 13, the real abuse, cheating and threats come from the farm-labor contractors.

Ironically, it’s the state of California which licenses farm labor contractors, allowing them complete control over the lives of the day laborers and undocumented workers.

According to the California Department of Industrial Relations Labor Code section 1682(b):

“Farm labor contractor” designates any person who, for a fee, employs workers to render personal services in connection with the production of any farm products to, for, or under the direction of a third person, or who recruits, solicits, supplies, or hires workers on behalf of an employer engaged in the growing or producing of farm products, and who, for a fee, provides in connection therewith one or more of the following services: furnishes board, lodging, or transportation for those workers; supervises, times, checks, counts, weighs, or otherwise directs or measures their work; or disburses wage payments to these persons.”

The state knowingly allows licensed farm labor contractors access to day laborer’s wages, housing and transportation, giving the labor contractors unbridled control over the vulnerable population of undocumented immigrants.

Federal government

Each of the speakers at the hearing said the federal government’s E-Verify system is used by employers to retaliate against undocumented workers. “U.S. law requires companies to employ only individuals who may legally work in the United States — either U.S. citizens, or foreign citizens who have the necessary authorization,” the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services agency says on its website. “E-Verify is an Internet-based system that allows businesses to determine the eligibility of their employees to work in the United States.”

U.S. employers are placed in a precarious position of being either legally required to hire only authorized, documented workers or end up being accused of using the verification system as a retaliatory measure.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement tries to stay out of these matters, spokeswoman Virginia Kice explained. It is standard practice for federal immigration officers to avoid getting involved in employer-employee labor issues.

The National Employment Law Project says employer abuses could be remedied in a number of ways, at least in California, including:

By Katy Grimes

SACRAMENTO — Immigration issues within states are becoming more prevalent. The usual complaints are that the federal government isn’t doing enough to enforce U.S. policy.

California is different. Earlier this year, it already embarked into uncharted territories, with the state Legislature voting to allow the children of undocumented aliens to attend the state’s public universities and colleges, at estimated costs of $65 million a year in financial aid and scholarships.

California: Sanctuary State

There have been many failed attempts to pass state laws allowing undocumented immigrants to live and work in California without the constant threat of deportation. Many say that this should have sent a clear message to lawmakers. Even a ballot initiative, the California Opportunity and Prosperity Act, failed to get enough signatures to quality for the November ballot.

“But noooooo,” as John Belushi used to say on “Saturday Night Live.”

Assemblyman Felipe Fuentes, D-Sylmar, together with Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, D-Sacramento, revived the attempt. In one of the most repugnant moves legislators can make, they gutted and amended SB 901, breathing new life into creating a “safe harbor” for illegal immigrants in California.

The sanctuary discussions began with allowing counties to opt in or out of becoming sanctuary counties. But when SB 901 was gutted and amended to include the new language, Steinberg used language that would make the entire state a sanctuary state.

But that’s not all, folks.

Assemblyman Tom Ammiano, D-San Francisco, led a contentious conversation in the Assembly Friday surrounding illegal immigrants over his bill, AB 1081, which seeks to remove the teeth of the Federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Secure Communities program.

Current law requires local law enforcement agencies to submit arrestees’ fingerprints to ICE, as well as several other Federal Bureau of Investigation databases, then have these federal agencies access the arrestee’s documented criminal and immigration history.

But according to Ammiano, this federal program is problematic because it allows local police agencies to investigate and enforce immigration laws on anyone in the U.S. illegally, instead of just pursuing and arresting the most dangerous illegal immigrants.

Picking and choosing which lawbreakers get deported is apparently what Ammiano wants California law enforcement to be able to do.

 California reality

California has more than a $16 billion deficit, but spends $21 billion annually on illegal, undocumented aliens. According to the Public Policy Institute of California, “Illegal immigrants make up about 28 percent of all foreign-born U.S. residents and slightly less than 4 percent of the  nation’s total population.” And according to the PPIC, “California has a higher share than the rest of the nation of illegal immigrants from Mexico. It has more illegal immigrants overall than any other state—an estimated 2.6 million.”

Apparently not content with spending money the state doesn’t have, lawmakers want to turn California into a sanctuary state.

Sanctuary cities

California is already home to more than 30 Sanctuary cities. Sanctuary cities offer  protection to illegal aliens and assistance through welfare benefits, along with refusing enforce the federal immigration laws, thereby offering sanctuary to those in the country illegally, and using taxpayer funds to support them.

In 2010, Los Angeles County spent  $52 million in welfare benefits to illegal immigrants. By the beginning of 2011, that figure jumped to nearly $600 million.

In 2008, Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, at the time the mayor of San Francisco, publicized the city’s sanctuary status in a  press release for San Francisco’s Sanctuary City Outreach Program.  Newsome tried to backtrack after it was discovered that the city’s sanctuary policy had protected illegal alien gang members accused of committing serious crimes, including murder.  “In 2009, Newsom attempted to veto an ordinance passed by San Francisco’s even more radical Board of Supervisors which prohibited illegal aliens charged with crimes from being detained by the Department of Homeland Security,” Ohio Jobs and Justice Pac reported.

Hardship stories

Assembly Speaker John Perez, D-Los Angeles, argued in favor of making California a sanctuary state, On Friday, he told the story of how a Sacramento woman who is in the state illegally was recently arrested “for selling tamales and trying to feed her family.”

Perez didn’t tell the entire story, but Assemblyman Brian Jones, R-Santee, did. Jones reminded lawmakers that the woman had been in the United States for 16 years and had been arrested several times for trespassing on private property.

For every story about personal hardship the media portrays, there are even more about illegal criminal aliens arrested for felony drunk driving, drug crimes, gang violence, vehicular manslaughter, murder, robberies, identity theft, and myriad other dangerous crimes.

“Illegal aliens are involved in criminal activities at a rate that is 2-5 times their representative proportion of the population,” according to P.F. Wagner, the author of “The Dark Side of Illegal Immigration.”

Impacts of legislation

Assemblyman Tim Donnelly, R-Twin Peaks, strongly opposed AB 1081, and said that  issuing driver’s licenses to undocumented immigrants rewards law breakers. “Not only is this wildly unpopular among the citizens, but it creates a national security risk,” said Donnelly in an interview.

“It is baffling that, every time our laws become inconvenient for people who are here illegally, we create a new exemption,” he said. “This pattern of pandering is a slap in the face to the law-abiding citizens and to the dedicated families and individuals who have waited for the opportunity to become Americans. We are going to give them California drivers licenses, allow them to vote, pay their college tuition and allow them to become lawyers.”

Donnelly challenged Ammiano Friday on the name of the bill, the “Trust Act,” and said it was “an insult to everyone in this country legally. It should be called the ‘Anti-Trust Act.'”

“We can’t debate the facts anymore,” Donnelly said. “The liberals claim that we don’t want diversity. But it’s liberals who don’t want legal immigrants. Because the immigrants who came here legally, they wave the flag, build businesses, and are fiscal conservatives. They understand what freedom means.”

Both bills have been passed by the Legislature, along party lines, and are headed to Gov. Jerry Brown for his signature or veto.

If the governor signs these bills and California becomes a sanctuary state for illegal immigrants, many are saying that Brown could be a one-term governor, or even face a recall. The bills have been whisked through without public input, and were drastically amended, demonstrating that California’s Democrat-controlled Legislature favors its own process over the people of the state.