You know, if Phil Valentine wants to debate immigration policy or even the effect immigration has had or will have on the state, that’s fine. But he discredits every single one of his points when he lists that “Highway signs in English and Spanish” will be a problem for the way Tennessee will look in the future.

They’re probably a decade ahead of us in terms of the illegal immigration problem, but we’re quickly closing that gap. It’s as if we have a crystal ball and can see what Tennessee will look like. Highway signs in English and Spanish, overcrowded hospital ERs, taxpayer-funded health care diverting resources away from needed services, more crime and the added cost of incarceration, more deaths on the highway. In many respects, we’re closer than we think.

Perhaps Phil needs to get out of his house more. Visit any continent and you’re bound to land in a country where the signs are in both the native language and English. Trust me, you’re never confused about where you are. Or is Phil’s point something more? Is it a *wink, wink, nudge, nudge* to his nativist friends who like to couch their xenophobia in fake public policy debate?

According to a report released by the Tennessee Comptroller’s office in August of last year:

Unauthorized aliens are not eligible for most federal, state and local public assistance programs such as TennCare, housing, food stamps and welfare. Federal law requires access to elementary and secondary education, as well as emergency health care.

Many economists nationwide agree the increase in immigrants boosts the national and state economies and that unauthorized aliens are not taking jobs or significantly affecting American workers’ wages. Unauthorized aliens contribute to state and local revenue through sales tax,
property tax included in rents and other consumption taxes.

A majority of Americans want immigration reform. Smart immigration reform. We can also witness first hand the negative effect of bad immigration policy by reading about the current situation in Springfield, TN:

Some estimate that 1,000 Hispanic residents fled the city in fear or went into hiding after a handful of immigration raids.

Those left behind deal with the fallout — empty homes and businesses and anxious waiting for what comes next.

Springfield landlord James Huffine said he’ll lose $5,000 this month in cleaning, hauling and lost rent after U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents arrested members of five families last month who lived in his apartment units. Huffine said his tenants showed him work identification and paycheck stubs issued by Electrolux, Robertson County’s largest employer, and he believed they were here legally.

“I don’t think people ought to be here illegally, but these raids, sweeping up people in the dead of night, it just doesn’t seem right or productive,” he said, motioning to the tangled mess at the edge of the road. “I know a lot of people think we need to get all the illegals out of here, but you’ve got to look at stuff like this. Look at what those raids have done to this entire town.”

and

County Mayor Howard Bradley said the change is noticeable. He blames faulty immigration policy for allowing the community to build its economy, at least in part, with illegal labor only to have it yanked away.

And can someone tell me why Valentine chooses to cite immigration “facts” from the Federation for American Immigration Reform, an organization the Southern Poverty Law Center has classified as a “hate group” because of its ties to White Supremacy Groups and the anti-latino and anti-catholic attitudes of its founder, John Tanton? Phil writes:

According to the Federation for American Immigration Reform, the net monetary cost of illegal immigration in Texas alone, after figuring in how much they pay in taxes, is somewhere north of $3.7 billion. We have the luxury of being able to see into our own future, and it is not pretty.

Is this hubris? How low will he go to boost his inflammatory rhetoric?

This post was written by Mary Mancini