80-19 Affirmative Fence Vote

Published: September 30, 2006, 10:23 am

This is exemplary of what grass roots activism can accomplish.

	From: Roy Beck, President, NumbersUSA
	Date: Friday 29SEP06 10:15 p.m. EDT

Master Headline Here

SENATORS GET OFF THE POLITICAL FENCE

THEY VOTE 80-19 TO BUILD
700 MILES OF DOUBLE-WALL FENCE
ON U.S.-MEXICAN BORDER

The Senate just finished passing the U.S. House of Representative's fence bill.

It will now go to President Bush who has promised to sign it.

This is a stand-alone bill. It was not bundled with any compromises, any increases in immigration, any new guestworker visas or any amnesty.

It deals only with making our southern border more secure and to further impede the flow of illegal workers and dependents.

Your incredible phoning today -- and all month -- and your relentless faxing and other pressure throughout the year left most Senators with little choice.

This fence was barely talked about two years ago and mostly thought to be a crackpot, off-the-wall (er, poor choice of words) idea -- and it still is by most of the newspaper editorial writers of this country. Our hat is off to www.WeNeedAFence.com, the Minutemen and a number of other smaller groups who really championed this rather obscure cause in the early stages.

So, how could this pass so overwhelmingly?

Ever since the House passed this fence bill 283-138 earlier this month, major Republican and Democratic leaders in the Senate have said they would refuse to allow this bill to come to a vote. They said passing an enforcement-only bill would take away a bargaining chip they need to pass a bill with guestworkers and an amnesty. They used all kinds of maneuvers to keep from having to vote directly on this bill.

But a lot of the Senators -- such as Sen. Martinez (R-FL) -- who so vociferously spoke against this bill ended up voting for it tonight.

Why? Because they knew that regular voting citizens like you would hold them accountable.

This lop-sided vote is absolutely a sign of the tremendous power that this growing citizen movement is accumulating -- and of your steadfast commitment.

You can read more about the fence and this bill (H.R. 6061) at:
http://www.numbersusa.com/hottopic/congress.html

JUST ANOTHER INCREMENTAL STEP -- BUT A VERY IMPORTANT ONE
This bill basically is the only step forward that Congress has taken this year in the fight against out-of-control mass immigration.

It is sad that this is all we got when we consider the great promise of the ATTRITION THROUGH ENFORCEMENT bill (H.R. 4437) passed last December by the House.

But the Senate refused to deal with it unless it could add an amnesty and incredible increases in legal immigration.

In addition, we have to remember that the bill tonight was not an appropriations bill. The money to fund the fence must come in another bill. Money for a few hundred miles appears to be in the pipeline, but the Senate so far has not shown signs of being willing to provide all the money to build all 700 miles.

Nonetheless, there will be plenty of money to get started. As this fence begins to be erected at and near the populated settlements along the Mexican border -- and as it clearly slows the illegal traffic -- we can hope that steps of success will breed more interest and more money for more fence in Congress next year.

FULL SUCCESS OF FENCE DEPENDS ON US WINNING OTHER TOOLS
Just about exactly a year ago, leaders of many national groups fighting immigration insanity -- and some key staffers from Congress -- met in a private room for dinner on Capitol Hill.

We struggled to come up with the most important three tools needed to substantially reduce the illegal alien population in the U.S.

We came up with three (not necessarily ranked by importance):

1. Build a fence on the Mexican border.

2. Mandate every employer to run every new hire (and eventually all existing employees) through a national computerized verification system to keep most illegal aliens out of a job.

3. Mandate that the federal government cooperate with any local law enforcement agency that calls to report having apprehended an illegal alien.

Our groups pledged to work jointly and cooperatively with each other and with our allies in Congress to reach these three goals.

We were amazed when, two months later, the U.S. House passed a bill with all three.

We are sorry that only one of the three top tools got through this Congress. BUT WE GOT ONE!

The effectiveness of the fence will be severely limited until we pass the other two tools. We look forward to working with you to do that in the year ahead.

In addition, NumbersUSA is pledged to three other top goals to reduce the illegal alien population:

1. Eliminate the chain migration categories that allow immigrants to choose the next immigrants by bringing in their adult relatives (other than spouse). Because this starts a chain that connects hundreds of cousins and in-laws and aunts and uncles and nephews and nieces for each new immigrant, it builds up gigantic expectations for whole communities in (usually poor) foreign countries. Although most of them must wait for years before their "number gets called," large numbers of them decide they already are entitled to live in the U.S. and just go ahead and enter the country illegally.

2. Eliminate the visa lottery that randomly picks 50,000 foreign nationals to come to the U.S. to become citizens each year. Because millions of people apply for the lottery, large numbers of them begin to believe that they may win some day and decide to just come on to the U.S. illegally and wait to win the lottery while here.

3. Eliminate anchor baby citizenship, a policy that gives automatic U.S. citizenship to any baby born of an illegal alien on U.S. soil. Most industrialized countries in the world that once awarded anchor baby citizenship have stopped because it is a huge magnet to encourage women to enter a country illegally. And the illegal aliens use their anchor babies as a tool to avoid deportation.

So, those three goals, plus the left-over two from last year, head up the very ambitious list of what we must continue to advocate in the months ahead.

This weekend, however, let's celebrate a significant victory.

GOOD FENCES MAKE GOOD NEIGHBORS

THANKS A LOT, NEIGHBORS,

-- ROY
This fence was barely talked about two years ago and mostly thought to be a crackpot, off-the-wall (er, poor choice of words) idea -- and it still is by most of the newspaper editorial writers of this country. Our hat is off to www.WeNeedAFence.com, the Minutemen and a number of other smaller groups who really championed this rather obscure cause in the early stages. So, how could this pass so overwhelmingly? Ever since the House passed this fence bill 283-138 earlier this month, major Republican and Democratic leaders in the Senate have said they would refuse to allow this bill to come to a vote. They said passing an enforcement-only bill would take away a bargaining chip they need to pass a bill with guestworkers and an amnesty. They used all kinds of maneuvers to keep from having to vote directly on this bill. But a lot of the Senators -- such as Sen. Martinez (R-FL) -- who so vociferously spoke against this bill ended up voting for it tonight. Why? Because they knew that regular voting citizens like you would hold them accountable. This lop-sided vote is absolutely a sign of the tremendous power that this growing citizen movement is accumulating -- and of your steadfast commitment. You can read more about the fence and this bill (H.R. 6061) at:

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80-19 Affirmative Fence Vote

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