My Form Letter from Senator Frist re: Illegal Immigration

Dear Friend:

Thank you for contacting me regarding comprehensive immigration reform. It is an honor to serve you as the Majority Leader of the United States Senate and a privilege to respond to your concerns.

Today there are 10 to 12 million undocumented aliens living in the United States, and many Americans believe that our immigration policies are in need of serious review. As a nation of immigrants who honor the rule of law, I believe we must make it a priority to secure our borders as a part of any effort to reform our immigration policies.

In order to address this issue I have introduced S. 2454, the Securing America’s Border Act, a billion-dollar down payment that focuses on border security and interior law enforcement and will enable the Senate to pursue comprehensive immigration reform. My proposal will add resources to border protection, give our immigration-enforcement officials new legal tools, invest in physical barriers and electronic surveillance equipment at the borders and make it easier for employers to ensure that they hire only citizens and legal residents. We need to make these investments because maintaining a secure border ranks among the most fundamental missions of any sovereign nation

While our country needs security at our borders in order to slow the flow of illegal immigration and enhance our national security, we still need to do more. A majority of the people who enter America illegally, after all, come here to work. Among other things, the full Senate will need to address ways we can balance security interests with our economy's labor needs. In the long term, our government needs to work on policies that encourage democracy and prosperity abroad which will also address our immigration crisis by reducing the number of people who feel that coming to the United States is their only option.

Let me be clear, I do not support amnesty, but I do understand the labor challenges facing our nation, and, as Majority Leader, I will continue to work with my colleagues to address this critical problem in the 109th Congress. On the basis of sound immigration policy, we can protect our borders, and continue to welcome legal immigrants, and in doing both we will improve the lives of all Americans.

Sincerely,


William H. Frist, M.D.
Majority Leader
United States Senate

P.S. Please visit http://frist.senate.gov to register for my e-mail newsletter.

 

I'll tell you how, CMG. In the State of Tennessee, illegal aliens are allowed to get driver's licenses. This came about a few years ago. When you go to the Driver's License Bureau on any typical day, you see a handful of blacks and whites. The rest are Hispanics. And the place is jammed nearly every day. You have to take a number and wait hours. Illegal aliens are drawn like a magnet to Tennessee and a couple of other states who hand the DL like candy. They even give them the test in Spanish. They must skip over the parts about how many passengers you can have in a car, mandatory state seat belts like the rest of us have to wear, and car seats for babies, because these people drive around unbelted, children unrestrained, and stuff passengers into cars and pickups. And how these people can possibly read the road signs is beyond me, because all the TN signs are in English, you know, our language we speak in America.

When people think about Nashville, they think country music. We've got that all right, but it's more like the tower of Babel at Sam's club, restaurants, etc., and all the places locals go, because there are so many foreigners speaking their native tongues. Today at the Chinese restaurant, there was only one other white couple in there. The Chinese were speaking English cause they work there. The rest of the patrons were Hispanic (probably 50-60 diners) all speaking Spanish. In Nashville public schools, 78 languages are spoken. Sometimes I want to scream, "why don't you speak English" but it wouldn't do any good, they wouldn't understand me anyway, and I'd probably be hauled off to the pokey as a mad woman. (So, what I do instead, is ask the Lord to send someone their way to share the Gospel with them while they're in this country. And I feel better.)

Bottom line, you show your Driver's License for ID and then, I guess, you can vote. Who cares, anyway. It's more money to line the pockets of the home builders and landscape companies around here. Not that they pass the "savings" onto the rest of us.