California's New 'Sanctuary State ' Law

 

The State of California is putting the finishing touches on the “California Values Act." Essentially, this is California's New 'Sanctuary State ' Law. The new law, just vetted and passed by the California Assembly Judiciary Committee would prevent state and local law enforcement from cooperating in any way with federal immigration authorities.



State Senate President Pro Tem Kevin De Leon, (D-Los Angeles), is sponsoring the state senate version of the new law, Senate Bill 54 to fight what he called the “Trump Deportation Machine.”

Back in February when he was first crafting the bill, De Leon admitted in an interview with left wing public broadcasting station KPPC that, "half my family is here illegally" and using fake IDs, a felony under California and federal law:

"I can tell you half of my family would be eligible for deportation under [President Donald Trump’s] executive order, because if they got a false Social Security card, if they got a false identification, if they got a false driver’s license prior to us passing AB60, if they got a false green card, and anyone who has family members, you know, who are undocumented knows that almost entirely everybody has secured some sort of false identification. That’s what you need to survive, to work. They are eligible for massive deportation."

“Someone simply who received or purchased a [fraudulent] Social Security card down at MacArthur Park, or elsewhere in my district would be eligible immediately for mass deportation,”

And of course, with a fake Social security card or a fake green card, many illegal migrants can easily obtain social welfare benefits like welfare, SSI, food stamps, section 8 public housing, and MediCal, California's taxpayer funded free medical care. And of course, they can - and many do- also vote, especially since in California  it's established policy  in social welfare  departments and the state's voter registration office not to check things like immigration status too closely.

 

That last fact is a huge reason why De Leon and many of his fellow Democrats are going all out to protect illegal migrants from being deported. Believe me, if illegal migrants voted Republican, people like De Leon would be calling out the National Guard to conduct mass deportations, and the Border Wall would have been built a long time ago. The Democrats want the votes of this new 'constituency' and the campaign donations from donors who love the continued flow of cheap labor.

 “Under constitutional threats from the reckless Trump administration, SB 54 protects state and local law enforcement and resources necessary to keep our communities safe,” De Leon said. De Leon also claimed that "Arrests of undocumented immigrants with no previous criminal record are up 150 percent since Trump became president.”

We'll explore these falsehoods in a second.

Assemblywoman Eloise Gomez Reyes chimed in, saying the measure is necessary not just for California, but for the nation. “California must send a clear message that we will remain the last line of defense against the fear-mongering and xenophobia,” Reyes said. “Rather than addressing the failure of policy, the federal solution has been to demonize our immigrant communities.”

Hmm...if these people she's talking about are 'immigrants' rather than illegal migrants,  why ever would they need fake IDs? And why would public policy in California need to have such strict measures against inquiring as to someone's immigration status? But I digress. None of these politicians seem overly concerned about ID theft, voter fraud or respecting any existing laws that conflict with their political agenda.

Back on May 25 of this year, there was a raid in which ICE agents arrested 188 illegal immigrants in Los Angeles. But according to U.S. immigration officials, total numbers of arrests of illegal immigrants are relatively flat in California and somewhat lower than during the Obama administration. So De Leon's nonsense about the 'Trump deportation machine' is simply partisan horse manure.

Oh, and his other remarks about how SB54 keeps our communities safe? Let's see how California's New 'Sanctuary State ' Law does that.

Most of the illegal migrants arrested in the May 25 raids had ties to El Salvadoran prison gangs such as MS-13, one of the most vicious and violent gangs in America. Almost 90 percent had previous criminal records for a variety of crimes including drug offenses, domestic violence, DUI, sex crimes, battery, weapons violations, assault, burglary, fraud, vehicle theft, arson, cruelty to a child, robbery, obstructing justice, property damage, larceny, escape, manslaughter, prostitution, trespassing, incest, and receipt of stolen property.

 

Under SB 54, none of these individuals would be transferred to ICE after serving their sentences after they were tried and convicted for these offenses. The bill specifies “serious felonies” but doesn't include almost all of the ones listed above. Instead of being turned over to ICE for deportation, these criminals would simply be released into the very communities De Leon and his cohorts claim SB 54 would 'keep safe.'

The question of the bill's legality is interesting.

SB 54 was given a a constitutional legal sign-off written by former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, who was paid a large sum for his analysis and is still on the State of California's payroll as it's lawyer to defend California's sanctuary policies. The state's Democrat legislators chose to pay for Holder's analysis rather than rely on one prepared by the California legislature's Legislative Council.

As Assemblyman Kevin Kiley, (R-Rocklin) pointed out, Holder announced his approval of SB 54 just one day before announcing his intention to run for president in 2020. how convenient!

So what are the actual legal precedents for California's New 'Sanctuary State ' Law?

The Constitution is pretty clear on the subject. The 10th Amendment  states that those powers not claimed by the Federal government in the Constitution "are clearly  are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." Control over immigration and naturalization, like the coining of money or foreign policy are expressly given to the Federal Government.

And legislation signed, ironically by none other than President Bill Clinton in the mid-1990s bars states from creating laws that restrict communication with federal law enforcement agencies.

Now there are also two recent decisions by the Supreme Court that ruled against Federal Law superseding state laws ( New York v. United States, 505 U.S. 144 [1992] and Printz v. United States, 521 U.S. 898 (1997). Neither involved powers reserved constitutionally to the Federal government, since one involved the dumping of waste within a sovereign state's borders and the other involved a clear violation of the Second Amendment via the Brady Bill.

There are also a few judicial decisions at the lower federal level, creating precedents that the federal government cannot commandeer local law enforcement resources for the purpose of immigration enforcement. SB 54 deals with all cooperation with ICE including merely providing information on criminal illegal migrants. Do these decisions apply? The feds are not asking for the use of manpower or other resources to round up illegal migrants  but merely for basic cooperation by local law enforcement that SB 54 essentially blocks,

Given the effort, time and taxpayer dollars Democrats are willing to spend in protecting illegal migrants, even criminals from being deported, California's New 'Sanctuary State' Law will probably be headed to the Supreme Court if Governor Brown signs it and SB 54 becomes law.