House Passes Kate’s Law, Plus Bill to Deny Federal Grants to Sanctuary Cities
But fate in Senate uncertain.
The House passed two bills today: One is known as Kate’s Law that increases penalties for illegal immigrants who keep trying to re-enter the United States, especially those who have criminal records. The second denies federal grants to sanctuary cities. From Fox News:
Kate’s Law is named for Kate Steinle, a San Francisco woman killed by an illegal immigrant who was in the U.S. despite multiple deportations. The two-year anniversary of her death is on Saturday.
President Trump called the bill’s passage “good news” in a tweet, adding “House just passed #KatesLaw. Hopefully Senate will follow.”
“He should not have been here, and she should not have died,” House Speaker Paul Ryan said Thursday, in a final push for Kate’s Law, an earlier version of which was blocked in the Senate last year.
“Our job here is to make sure that those professionals have the tools that they need and the resources that they need to carry out their work and to protect our communities. That is what these measures are all about,” added Ryan.
The U.S. already deported Steinle’s alleged shooter Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez five times. He also has seven felony convictions.
President Donald Trump often made time for other families who lost loved ones to illegal immigrants when he was on the campaign trail. He reminded everyone of some of those families on Wednesday:
On Wednesday, President Trump highlighted other cases during a White House meeting with more than a dozen families of people who had been victimized by illegal immigrants, including Jamiel Shaw Sr.
Shaw’s 17-year-old son Jamiel was shot and killed by an illegal immigrant in California in March 2008..
“He was living the dream,” Shaw said during the meeting. “That was squashed out.”
Kate’s murder brought sanctuary cities to the forefront. These are cities that provide a safe haven for illegal immigrants. Yes, San Francisco is one of them. The “No Sanctuary for Criminals Acts” means those states and cities will not receive federal grants as long as they “refuse to cooperate with law enforcement carrying out immigration enforcement activities.”
Kate’s Law in the Senate
However, before the bills go to Trump, the Senate needs to approve them. That may not happen. From CNN:
Kate’s Law has been introduced before and failed to get the 60 votes needed to advance in the Senate last year. It did pick up three Democratic votes — Indiana Sen. Joe Donnelly, North Dakota Sen. Heidi Heitkamp and West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin — but to pass the Senate, Republicans would need five more Democrats to join all Republicans in voting yes.
Other red-state Democrats have already voted against the bill. The sanctuary cities bill could garner even less support, as lawmakers protest the cuts in law enforcement funding.
And Emily Jashinsky at The Washington Examiner thinks either one will not easily pass through the Senate:
Democrats are under pressure to distance themselves from his agenda at all costs or risk an onslaught of attacks from progressives unbothered by the task of slamming them for cooperating with President Trump on any policies. In that environment, it makes it difficult to imagine any additional Democrats shifting to side with Republicans.
But she mentions an article in The Hill that mentions Senate Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-MD) “signaled more understanding for members of his party who sided with Republicans on” Kate’s law:
Hoyer said the GOP proposal has flaws –– particularly as it relates to those immigrants seeking asylum –– and he lamented the closed process that prevents Democrats from offering amendments.
Still, Democrats won’t apply a full-court press as they whip against “Kate’s Law,” given the emotional forces underlying the Steinle tragedy and others like it.
Hoyer suggested the “public’s perception of allowing people to come back in, commit crimes and not have a more serious sentence” could harm vulnerable Democrats.
“You talk to the families who have been adversely affected by that, it is a wrenching experience,” he said Tuesday morning.
“Members believe that that’s pretty serious business, [and] I agree with that.”
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Comments
It’s pro-native, pro-diversity (i.e. anti-[class] diversity or judgment by “color of skin”), pro-emigration reform, anti-social justice adventurism, anti-sardine policy (i.e. high density population centers), anti-progressive debt (compensated through redistributive change and population replacement), etc.
Of course, it will not pass.
Democrats lose votes and class leverage. Businesses lose subsidized demand.
There is nothing in the Constitution about needing 60 votes. The Republicans don’t know how to wield power and it hurts the country.
Republicans are compromised by overlapping and convergent interests with Democrats.
How do the Democrats overcome diametrically conflicted and divergent special and peculiar interests?
There’s nothing about it in the constitution, but there is in the senate rules. And changing those rules would be the utmost folly, since it’s certain that Republicans won’t always have the majority. When we’re in the minority again we’ll be glad we didn’t get rid of the filibuster.
Those who claim that the moment the Ds get the majority they’ll get rid of it themselves are either dishonest or fools. The Ds had the majority for most of the 0bama years, and the Rs used the filibuster to its fullest extent, to the Ds’ great frustration, and yet they left it intact. They got rid of it for nominations, and now they regret it bitterly, but they’re glad they kept it for legislation; there is no chance at all that they’d be so foolish as to get rid of it the next time they’re in charge.
The only reason 0bamacare even exists is because for a while the Ds had 60 votes, but as soon as they dropped to 59 they could no longer pass anything like that. That’s why it came out the mess it did, because with only 59 senators they couldn’t pass the amendments they’d been planning.
F89k it! Change the rules, pass the laws required to protect America and let the girls cry in to their curds and whey.
And when the Ds have 51 senators? What will you do then, when you no longer have the filibuster to protect you? The Ds are now regretting at length what they did in haste, ending the filibuster on nominations. A wise man learns from other people’s mistakes, not from his own.
Change it back before power shifts to the ‘rats. 🙂
Once you’ve changed it, it’s gone. Change it back and they’ll just do the same as soon as they have the numbers. You can’t limit something like this with artificial stipulations, as we just saw with judicial nominations. The Democrats got rid of the filibuster for all nominations, “except for the supreme court”; that distinction was always transparently phony, and sure enough the Republicans just swept it away, as the Ds would have done the moment it became inconvenient to them. The legislative filibuster, however, they wisely left alone, and put up with the Rs using it to frustrate everything they wanted to do, and now they’re glad of it.
That clarifies things.
The Dems aren’t protecting unfairly targeted “immigrants”.
They’re protecting homicidal criminals.
Or am I missing some nuance in that cross the Libs have nailed themselves to?
Progressives and liberals are Pro-Choice. A selective child policy is central to their religious/moral philosophy. The only difference from the Chinese one-child policy, is that Western leftists are advocates for the Choice, but avoid culpability through delegation.
Can’t the Senate Rules Committee decide that this law can be passed thru reconciliation requiring only 51 votes to pass?
The grants thing could be included in the reconciliation bill, but “Kate’s Bill” can’t be, because it’s not a budget measure.
Add to this a law that makes it a crime for anyone to provide Federal Government funds/aid to help illegals.
The Senate will always be a problem as long as crooked democrats like McCain are in office.
The GOPe knows that it cannot treat the rest of their so-called platform with the open contempt they treat the repeal of Obamacare, or Republicans will be hunting officeholders in the streets with dogs. The House passed these two bills. The Senate, with McConnell’s help, will kill them. The next platform items will be first passed by the Senate and killed in the House.
Then in 2018 they will whine that if only we give them 110 Senators and 500 members of the House, this time they will REALLY, REALLY do something.
When will enough of us get it that the rino rats of the GOPe are actually rats?
I believe you guys had your chance with the Tea Party to get rid of the Democrats amongst your ranks.
It’s NOT a surprise the libTurds & demoCraps are not supporting this Bill. They have proven time and time again they care MORE for illegals, Criminals, Rapists, Murderers than they do Americans. STOP voting them into public office.
Huh? Where have I been? When did Steny Hoyer go to the Senate? How?
We need names of any senator that votes against this bill.