Anti-immigrant activist legislation diverting attention from real problem
From April 28, 2008
The Kansas City Star’s editorial board published an opinion piece today making the obvious but overlooked observation that the recent trend of state and local governments passing anti-immigrant measures takes the pressure off of federal politicians to do their duty to pass legislative reforms to address national problems.
The editorial board also stated, “When politicians take the time to study accurate information rather than the inflated numbers put out by anti-immigration zealots, they often discover they can cause more problems for legal immigrants and U.S. citizens than for immigrants living and working illegally in their states..” We’ve found this to be the case in Oklahoma. We’ve made it difficult for citizens and permanent residents to do basic tasks such as renewing an expired driver license. Everyone seems to know more than one person who spent a whole day just to get a license renewed. Nevermind that you could not get a driver license in Oklahoma if you were an undocumented worker before this law passed. The law has not kept one undocumented person from getting a driver license. However, it has caused a lot of citizens frustration and wasted their valuable time.