The Washington Post reports:
Things got a bit heated when the issue of enforcing immigration warrants came up last week during Montgomery County Police Chief J. Thomas Manger's monthly meeting with members of the Latino community.
State Del. Ana Sol Gutierrez (D-Montgomery) was challenging Manger's decision to ask officers to pick up immigration violators and turn them over to the federal government. The civil warrants in recent years have been added to the FBI-run National Crime Information Center database and pop up when a county officer runs a computer check during routine stops.
Manger said he wished the warrants weren't in the database but couldn't ask his officers to ignore them. Manger has been criticized by some in the county who have called him a member of the Minuteman Project, an anti-illegal-immigration group.
The discussion prompted former County Council member Michael L. Subin, who heads the county's Criminal Justice Coordinating Commission, to stand up and defend Manger.
"Anyone who questions the honor of Chief Manger is questioning my honor," Subin said. "If you compare him to the Minutemen, you are calling him a racist and a fascist."
Gutierrez -- who identified herself when the meeting began only as a "citizen and taxpayer," not as a delegate -- reiterated that she felt the civil warrants didn't belong in the database, which was created as a repository for criminal records.
"I give up," Subin said, as he stormed out of the room. "I don't want to waste my breath."
Later that day, Gutierrez and other Latino leaders met with County Executive Isiah Leggett (D) but failed to persuade him to ask Manger to disregard the warrants.
Immigration isn't controversial just at the national level, though I fear that the federal government's failure to address the issue in a serious way will only exacerbate the problem. I'm just glad that the Constitution prevents this from becoming a multi-generational problem like in so many other countries without birthright citizenship. Section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment reads:
All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.While the share of Latinos in the U.S. who are not American citizens is somewhere between 40 and 50 percent, the share of Latinos under the age of 18 who are citizens (and future voters) is over 80 percent. Politicians and parties should take note.
