Florida legislators are about to enact a bill that criminalizes or punishes anyone who aids or hires undocumented immigrants. One of the new crimes was giving a ride to an immigrant. Church leaders loudly complained that they would not be allowed to pick up immigrants and take them to church.
Humanitarian appeals fell on deaf ears, but the legislators went too far went they interfered with going to church.
TALLAHASSEE — State lawmakers rewrote language Monday in a sweeping immigration bill that religious leaders said could have subjected them to felony charges if they transported people living in the country illegally to church or Sunday school.
A Florida House panel advanced a revised bill that no longer makes it a felony crime to knowingly transport someone without legal status within Florida.
“If it’s within the state of Florida, they are not held liable to any wrongdoing,” said Rep. Kiyan Michael, R-Jacksonville, the bill’s sponsor.
Sister Ann Kendrick, who founded the Hope CommUnity Center in Apopka that helps Central Florida’s immigrant families, was among those calling for lawmakers to reconsider the bill.
“I cart people around all the time who are undocumented,” she said. “I’ll go to jail for… helping a kid? Wow, isn’t that the American way?”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Now, we cain’t be havin no xtians being arrested for goin ta church.
I am sure that Florida legislators heard from agriculture and construction companies as well. Farm workers are often picked up at a central location and transported to the fields by bus. Likewise, construction workers are often brought to the job site in a car on van by ‘el jefe.’ (the boss) The GOP is careful not to bite the hand that feeds it.
These Flor-uh-duh legislators are spiteful, vile, repugnant morons.
Going after the most vulnerable among us. Yeah, some “Christians.”
Harriet Tubman now knows what Al Shanker feels like.
yup
Horrible to see how these parasites promote themselves with hatred. Immigrants this week, trans people next, and you and me next.
The economic reality is that minimally educated, low-skilled, low-income people receive far more in public benefits than they will ever pay in taxes. That’s true whatever their citizenship status. Numerous cities have had huge numbers of illegal immigrants arrive in their areas because of the near total lack of border security. NYC Mayor Eric Adams recently said that his city is being crushed by the costs of caring for the illegal immigrants that have gone there in huge numbers. He’s obviously correct about those costs. But Adams doesn’t want any restrictions on immigration; he wants the federal government to pay those costs. It’s not racist or xenophobic to cite these realities – it’s fact whatever your position is on illegal immigration.
But it is racist to use the issue of illegal immigration to get votes because you know certain voters hate people who are different.
No “but” needed. See the sources below, Roy.
The creeps in the Flor-uh-duh legislature and gun club are all about the racist hate legislation, and the perks for fat cats, and licking DeStalin’s jackboots, and then going and making a show of themselves at church. Disgusting cretins.
This is misinformation. If you care to get your head out of Fox News for a bit and read some actual facts about this, here:
https://www.brookings.edu/research/a-dozen-facts-about-immigration/
And here:
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/economy/making-sense/4-myths-about-how-immigrants-affect-the-u-s-economy
Speading LIES about undocumented immigrants IS racist. Don’t do it. Educate yourself.
I read to be informed about this matter, and I don’t watch any TV news. No liberal at Brookings would dare defy the pro-open borders narrative – that would be career ending. Educate yourself. Low income people – legal or illegal status of any race – on average don’t contribute enough in taxes to cover the costs of the public benefits they receive. In a progressive tax system and modern welfare state, that’s reality. All prominent Democrats said this before 2008. So was Barack Obama a racist?
https://www.c-span.org/video/?c4656370/user-clip-sen-barack-obama-illegal-immigration
I read many newspapers. I watch TV news. I worked at Brookings. I have NEVER heard anyone call for open borders. You must get this from FOX. Or Tucker Carlson.
Cathy
By definition, slaves don’t pay taxes.
But they do. Many have taxes withheld from their pay. Many use an ITIN in lieu of a Social Security number to file and pay taxes.
From the Bipartisan Policy Center:
he IRS estimates that undocumented immigrants pay over $9 billion in withheld payroll taxes annually. Undocumented immigrants also help make the Social Security system more solvent, as they pay into the system but are ineligible to collect benefits upon retiring. In 2010, $12 billion more was collected from Social Security payroll taxes of undocumented workers than were paid out in benefits.
Do Undocumented Immigrants Collect Benefits?
Undocumented immigrants are eligible for VERY FEW federal benefits (Table 1). One notable tax benefit that they have traditionally been eligible for is the Child Tax Credit, a partially refundable credit designed to support low-income families based on their dependent children. A report from the Treasury Department estimated that undocumented immigrants received $4.2 billion in refundable child tax credits in 2010, or roughly one-eighth of the total paid.
Exactly the opposite of what is said on Faux News and Not-so-Bright Bart and by morons like loser ex-prez Trump and ex-hate-commentator Carlson. And because these places and people spread the falsehoods, people like the person who commented above repeat them, and they are widely believed. Another example. Economists know that undocumented immigrants, like other people, create demand which creates jobs, and estimates are that the net effect on jobs is about a 1 percent INCREASE in number of jobs available to American citizens. THIS IS WELL KNOWN. But Trump and Carlson and Fox etc. keep repeating the LIES.
Brookings is a LIBERAL institution? ROFLMAO!!!! OMG!!! Hilarious.
Brookings is definitely not “liberal.” I know. I worked there. Most people have worked in government. Both parties.
Exactly. About as bi-partisan, middle of the road, as it gets. And generally, high quality stuff.
To the Alito and Trump-era rightwing, EVERYTHING that isn’t frothing at the mouth with hatred for people of color, LGBTQX persons, immigrants, and non-Christians is part of the GREAT LIBERAL PRECIOUS BODY FLUID CONSPIRACY, or “Socialism,” as they call it. The multiplication table? Part of the conspiracy. ROFLMAO.
Notice, Linda, that the people who spew those hateful lies have ZERO interest in the facts, in learning anything that might disturb their unshakeable belief in the inferiority of those OTHERS whom they despise.
Bob-
You’re correct about the facts and your observations about Cathy. Frequently, attitudes like Cathy’s are those of people who have inherited wealth/privilege which they are trying to protect. And, often they have sociopathic tendencies.
Bob Shepherd shows again that he has little understanding of economic realities that refute prevailing left-wing dogmas. He doesn’t factor in the costs of public school education for the kids of illegal/undocumented immigrants which total over $20,000 annually for bilingual education in big city districts. He doesn’t factor in housing costs like in NYC that run into tens of millions of dollars per week. No accounting for the health care costs when the undocumented go to hospital emergency rooms and receive other medical services that they have no means to pay for. As the liberal economist Paul Krugman wrote: “Unfortunately, low-skill immigrants don’t pay enough taxes to cover the cost of the benefits they receive.”
Broaden your sources of knowledge outside the left-wing bubble and you might have a chance of being well-informed on this topic.
Pathetic.
These people are impervious to facts. Hate builds walls. Information doesn’t get in.
There is no reasoning with the sort of person who conceptualizes other people’s CHILDREN as burdens and vermin.
Consider, for example, the oft-repeated rightwing talking point (Trump uses this all the time), “They’re taking your/our jobs.” The fact is, and economists know this, that undocumented immigrants, LIKE EVERYONE ELSE, create demand. They buy groceries and gasoline and get haircuts. And the demand they create, like that created by anyone else, CREATES jobs. Furthermore, as RT mentioned, they start small businesses that employ others at TEN TIMES the rate that citizens do (according to Brookings).
But again, hatred is a wall that people build around themselves, and the facts do not get through. A quarter of children in the U.S. live in poverty, but Maserati Joe Manchin says that give poor parents a child tax credit, and “They will just spend it on drugs.”
There is no reasoning with such loathsome people.
Krugman himself says that undocumented immigrants mean an average of a 1 percent GAIN in earnings for American citizens. Gee, we better protect ourselves FROM THAT GAIN!
Idiotic.
Cathy
Speaking of an understanding of economcs- marginal cost of an additional student in a class already assembled ?
Yup
Bob Shepherd again just hurls insults because the facts don’t advance his preferred narrative. He thinks he knows more than Paul Krugman. Pathetic.
As the liberal economist Paul Krugman wrote: “Unfortunately, low-skill immigrants don’t pay enough taxes to cover the cost of the benefits they receive.”
He wrote that overall, Americans see a 1 one percent GAIN in economic value from the fact of undocumented workers.
GAIN. Oh Lord. Protect me from the GAIN!!!
ROFL.
Bob Shepherd still doesn’t address the Krugman statement that “Unfortunately, low-skill immigrants don’t pay enough taxes to cover the cost of the benefits they receive.” A small 1% increase in GDP doesn’t yield enough additional tax revenue to offset the costs of those benefits. Math is hard for some people. It’s easier for them to just recite political ideology.
Haaaaa. We are talking about miniscule amounts at the margins of our economy, offset by ENORMOUS benefits. All those children of wealthy, pampered, racist white people who are looked after, all their nicely manicured lawns and golf courses.
And intangibles like the incredible richness that is ADDED to a culture that becomes MORE DIVERSE.
Krugman’s argument pretty much sucks here. Let’s suppose that he got his way and immigration were dramatically curtailed and there was some increase in availability of THE WORST JOBS IN AMERICA for the MOST UNSKILLED PEOPLE IN AMERICA. Supply and demand, the number of unskilled citizens would increase, right? Which would make up for the decrease in undocumented immigrants. And I am certainly not sure that Krugman actually has the numbers to back up his iffy assertion. BTW, I would happily pit my math skills against yours any time.
He didn’t actually provide any statistics to back up this wild claim made in that piece written 17 YEARS AGO.
That Krugman piece from 2006 was published in a forum that has limited space. You think you know more than Krugman about this economic topic. LOL.
You think that you are morally superior to and know more than does a father or mother who undergoes hardship you cannot even begin to imagine in order to provide for and protect his or her children. Such people are NOBLE in my book. And they DESESRVE our support, not to have spurious infamy heaped upon them.
And THAT is what the American Dream is REALLY all about. Those who don’t grok that are not actual patriots. They don’t understand what we are actually about in this country. They are FREAKING CLUELESS. And nasty and mean spirited to boot.
Basically, rightwing politicians and their propagandistic media use the issue of immigration and its MINOR overall economic effects to whip up the racist base and distract them from the fact that they serve only the oligarchs and CONSISTENTLY vote against the economic interests of the poor and what remains of the middle class. This is ALL ABOUT distracting from their actual agenda, which is buttering up the fat-cat donors. And so we get appalling stuff like the KIDNAPPINGS of the children (even the babies!!!!) of asylum seekers by Trump, Sessions, and Propaganda Minister Stephen “Goebbels” Miller. It plays well on Fox. Sickeningly, disgustingly, it does. It’s 2-minutes hates. Same thing that Hitler did with his stuff about foreigners and the “enemy within.”
Let all reasonable people thank Bob Shepherd for his most recent comment on this thread. It shows that his viewpoint on this issue is inspired by sentimentality rather than economic logic. He has a right to that sentimentality, but he can’t claim that his opinion is grounded in sound economic reasoning – it’s not, as even the very liberal Paul Krugman shows.
OMG.
So, there you have BOTH the Either-Or Fallacy AND a claim that how people FEEL about moral issues is irrelevant. BIZARRE.
https://bobshepherdonline.wordpress.com/2020/03/05/science-and-ethics/
“economic logic”
OMG. ROFL!!!
What matters to entities, including people, and the extent to which particular outcomes matter, are facts about the world, the same as facts about the population of Mumbai or the atomic weight of sodium are. So, considering those is not mere “sentimentality.” It’s paying attention to facts that really matter. This ought to be obvious enough, and it’s a bit ridiculous to have to explain it. But evidently one does have to.
I explain this in more detail in the essay on Science and Ethics.
Again, here:
https://bobshepherdonline.wordpress.com/2020/03/05/science-and-ethics/
A “one percent gain” is better than Wall Street’s 2% drag on GDP.
Cathy is like the women Michael Moore showed in his movie, Roger and Me. They were playing on a golf course while expressing hostility to others for being unproductive.
There was an interesting article in Brookings from the year 2000. ” If they (Republicans) hadn’t succeeded in roughly doubling the 20 or so percent share of the Catholic vote they got in JFK’s election, Republicans would not control Congress and would not have a chance in presidential elections.”
The author drew the additional conclusion, younger Catholic women are more Democratic and younger Catholic men are more Republican.
It’s an old game. All the Fascists have played it. get the poorly educated Reich-wing folks all riled up with disinformation about immigrants or foreigners so that they pay attention to imaginary problems with those folks while you bilk the country.
Linda, I was not making observations about Cathy pe se. I try to avoid personalizing this stuff. It’s a GENERAL problem among rightwingers. Fox news, and especially such evil creepers as Tucker Carlson, have spent years working barely educated persons into a lather about immigrants based on lies. It’s really awful because a lot of human suffering results because people don’t care about the plights of these poor, dispossessed, unfortunate people willing to work HARD to make something of themselves.
If Cathy votes for Republicans, she doesn’t care about women’s rights.
Those in the millionaire and billionaire classes receive far more from what the average tax payer subsidizes, than those who receive assistance to live another day, including immigrants and refugees.
exactly
The solution for making tax payers of those low skilled workers whether Citizen or undocumented is to pay them more. Unless you truly believe that compensation is based on skills rather than the political power to insure a larger piece of the pie. A lot of educated skilled teachers in Red States might disagree with you. A lot of adjunct Professors might as well. Or research scientists working with MRNA who starved for decades till some won a lottery.
A lot of highly skilled , highly paid Union construction workers losing market share in droves to Contractors exploiting undocumented Labor might as well. Without being to demeaning, immigrants who were picking bananas a few months before. As they seek restrictions on immigration (and always have) rather than fair compensation for all. Our myth of meritocracy is almost as fictitious as our immigration myth.
Joel:
The American economic pie:
Bob Shepherd
Well in news that should cheer you up, Disney just took DeScuzziest to Federal Court . Of course Disney is part of that inequality problem. But DeScuzziest does not care about inequality.
Awesome, Joel. And thank you for your informed perspective from a vantage point that I don’t share.
and meanwhile, guess who is a) watching these Flor-uh-duh legislators’ kids, mowing their lawns, fixing their roofs, and harvesting the beets made into the sugar that goes into their coffee?
And, in fact, reasonable immigration laws thirty years ago would mean that we would not be having a divisive argument about immigration. But reasonable debate is bad for political business and far right talk show hosts.
A Note to the Florida Legislature and White Supremacist Hate Group:
31 When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory:
32 And before him shall be gathered all nations: and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats:
33 And he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left.
34 Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world:
35 For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in:
36 Naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me.
37 Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, and fed thee? or thirsty, and gave thee drink?
38 When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and clothed thee?
39 Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee?
40 And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.
41 Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels:
42 For I was an hungred, and ye gave me no meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me no drink:
43 I was a stranger, and ye took me not in: naked, and ye clothed me not: sick, and in prison, and ye visited me not.
44 Then shall they also answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, or athirst, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister unto thee?
45 Then shall he answer them, saying, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me.
46 And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal.
Matthew 25, KJV
You have made clear many times that you’re an atheist who hates all religions other than the current cult of wokeism. I’m an amiable agnostic. Why are you quoting scripture from a religion you despise and believe should over no influence over public policies?
I often quote from the wisdom literature of the world. This is a wise passage. And the Flor-uh-duh legislators, for the most part, call themselves Christians, so they could well spend some time actually learning what the rabbi Yeshua of Nazareth actually taught.
This is not difficult to understand.
And, in fact, I am not an atheist. I have made THAT clear many times.
Here:
“cult of wokism”
Oh, now that is funny.
I have spent a lot of my lifetime studying the mythologies of the world. I prize much of what I have learned from them. But I know the difference between verifiable truth and superstition. LOL.
And I know, or think I do, when I read something in an ancient myth or folktale or teaching that has a powerful and valuable moral message that is worth sharing. OBVIOUSLY. That’s why I teach a lot of material from the oral traditions of the world. Because it has value.
And obviously, the teachings of Jesus are not the religions (plural), the Christianities (plural) that usurped and distorted those. I’ve written a LOT about that as well.
https://bobshepherdonline.wordpress.com/2021/12/24/on-the-morning-of-christs-nativity-1-bob-shepherd/
Jefferson- In every age, in every country, the priest aligns with the despot.
If the Catholic bishops were against Republicans like DeSantis, the mobilization efforts of the Catholic Conferences would look different.
“current cult of wokeism”?
Define wokeism. And name the previous ones if this one is “current.”
God, it’s like a fat fish in a small barrel.
Perhaps the previous “cults of wokism,” Greg, were the ones that abolished slavery, ended child labor, gave women the right to vote, created Social Security and Medicare.
Oh, wait, the Repugnicans want to bring child labor back now. I guess that reading Sam Alito’s quoting 17th-century witch hunters inspired them. We could use Charles Dickens in Arizona right now. He would have some choice things to say to Sarah Huckster-bee Slanders.
I have been known to quote chicken little, too, but that doesn’t mean that I believe in talking chickens. LMAO.
Some years ago I met a pastor who sold tee shirts at various Christian conventions. He was on his way back from one of these things and we were marooned in Detroit when our flight was delayed.
He shared that he had designed a tee with the verses you quote above. It featured something about the least of these with a picture of a child. Between Scotches he told us it was his favorite shirt, but it did not sell. Somehow his story explained the Scotch.
So sad, Roy!!!!
So, these people undergo incredible hardship in order to get here and to stand on a rooftop doing shingling in the Florida sun for 10-hour days and to go back to sleep in a room with 8 other guys so that they can get up at 5:00 AM and do it all over again so they can send a few meagre dollars home to feed their hungry kids or their hungry, elderly parents. And they pay far more in taxes than they get in services, for they are eligible for almost no government services in most parts of the country.
THAT”S WHAT ACTUAL NOBILITY LOOKS LIKE, FOLKS.
And then pampered, overfed white cretins who have never known real work or real hardship sit eating their bon-bons and drinking their lattes and effusing on the internet about how they aren’t doing their share and how the scraps that go to these people’s innocent children should be withheld from them.
SICKENING AND DISGUSTING. The people who perpetuate the lies about immigrants (that they take more than they give and that they decrease the number and quality of American jobs) revolt me. These people are clueless. Clueless about the facts. Clueless about what it means REALLY to work for a living. Clueless about the teaching of the Christ that they purport to worship. Clueless. And willful cluelessness, maintained over time, becomes, of course, just evil.
FYI-Immigrants are often job creators as they can rarely get a job other than a menial one working for someone else. https://news.mit.edu/2022/study-immigrants-more-likely-start-firms-create-jobs-0509
Exactly, RT. Brookings has published reports on this as well. They create jobs at 10 times the rate of citizens, according to Brookings.
As the liberal economist Paul Krugman wrote:
“Unfortunately, low-skill immigrants don’t pay enough taxes to cover the cost of the benefits they receive.”
What part of this is so hard to understand?
Krugman says that overall, Americans get a net GAIN from the presence of undocumented workers, though it is small. His issue is that he believes that, even though these workers create more jobs than they take, according to Krugman, they compete with the LOWEST SKILLED Americans for the WORST JOBS. LOL Again. In states around the country right now, we have Repugnican ghouls trying to reintroduce CHILD LABOR because of lack of sufficient low-cost labor to do low-end jobs.
We are an immigrant nation, and we used to respect hard work. Now, we’ve become lazy and fat and pampered and RACIST on the top end. And our Fascists speak of people’s children as burdens and vermin. Because “family values”?
Oh, and, thought for the day: A well-regulated militia doesn’t kill schoolchildren.
HAT-RED
HATRED
Hate’s on a continuum.
My rejoinder was going to be, I loathe people who wear MAGA hats.
I’d give a hand up to one who fell into a ditch. (If it was Charles Koch or Uihlein, I’d think twice.)
MAGA hat wearers enjoy their bully image. They’re inclined to relish in the suffering of those who they think are lesser.
Then, there are the right-wing
church goers who “lord” it
over the poor feeling better about themselves.
Yes, hate is, in America, mostly red. HATE-RED. Look at the shooters. White male right-wing extremists, typically. Fed on Fox news anti-immigrant hate speech and internet memes (“Stand your ground,” “Don’t tread on me”).
Interesting turn of events about Carlson’s firing-
Friday night he spoke at the Koch’s Heritage Foundation’s 50th anniversary gala. Heritage was co-founded by a right wing Catholic, Paul Weyrich. (Btw- Weyrich called for the parallel schools, a plot that expands religious schools and bankrupts public schools.) At the Heritage event, Carlson’s speech was heavy with religion talk. While Koch and the religious right came to understand how they could advantage each other’s interests, Huffpo opines that Murdoch doesn’t like the religious angle, therefore, Carlson’s firing.
Huffpo’s assessment would be strengthened by introduction of the idea that accumulative effect tipped the scale. Many of the Fox on-air personalities like Laura Ingraham are right wing religious.
The Wall Street Journal has a long story today about why Tucker Carlson was fired. In his emails, which were redacted but revealed by the Dominion case, Tucker called a female executive the C word. Lots of other insults for colleagues. He thought he was too big to fail. They fired him.
I added comment about a NLTE board member to your post about the organization.
In a newer different thread, I’ll be adding info. from the Guardian about, “Russian agents in cossacks traded for 28 Ukrainian servicemen.”
The evidence of the orthodox church’s undermining of Ukrainain freedom is informative.
I appreciate you letting me add comment.
And he wanted 100 million in his new contract.
The Wall Street Journal explains today why Carlson was fired. It was his arrogance, his insults toward his bosses.esp his female boss.
Hard to believe that was new behavior, or behavior that gets anyone immediately fired at Fox.
It wasn’t. What might be happening is that a lot of shocking stuff is going to come out in the upcoming lawsuit, and it might appear that Fox knew about this behavior and did nothing, which would open them up to liability. So, they take this move so that they can say, “See! When we found out about this, we did something!”