A high-ranking Republican state lawmaker from the Atlanta area issued an open letter to Georgia’s two U.S. senators Monday, urging them to oppose the immigration overhaul bill now pending in Congress.
House Majority Whip Ed Lindsey, who is running for Georgia’s 11th congressional seat, said Senate Bill 744 doesn’t do enough to secure the nation’s borders.
Lindsey also opposes provisions in the bill that would create a 13-year path to citizenship for immigrants living illegally in the U.S. Further, he questioned how the legislation would affect Georgia.
“We have seen no cost estimate on how great a financial burden this bill will place on the state of Georgia and local governments in terms of the increased burden on state and local services,” said Lindsey, who co-sponsored a sweeping 2011 state law aimed at cracking down on illegal immigration.
Spokesmen for Sens. Saxby Chambliss and Johnny Isakson have said the Republican lawmakers won’t take a position on the federal legislation until they have reviewed the bill, which stretched 844 pages before it was amended last month. The Senate Judiciary Committee passed the bill on a bipartisan vote last month. It could come to the Senate floor for a vote as soon as next week. A bipartisan group of U.S. House lawmakers is crafting its own immigration bill.
Republican U.S. Rep. Phil Gingrey, who represents Georgia’s 11th congressional district, has announced he is running for Chambliss’ Senate seat. Chambliss has said he won’t seek a third term in 2014.
Former congressman Bob Barr, who is also running for Georgia’s 11th district seat, opposes the federal legislation.
“We don’t need immigration ‘reform,’” he said in a telephone interview Monday. “What we need is immigration enforcement. There is no reason to try and reinvent the wheel simply to address a very serious problem we have in this country. We have more than sufficient laws already on the books to deal with the problem of illegal immigration, if we simply choose to enforce them. And we are not doing that.”
State Sen. Barry Loudermilk, R-Cassville, is also running for Georgia’s 11th District seat. Like Lindsey and Barr, Loudermilk is critical of the immigration legislation.
“Immigration reform has to start with border security,” he said in a prepared statement. “Trust in Washington is at a low point with me and with most Americans and, if Washington wants us to trust them on immigration, they should secure the borders first and come back to us for the rest. The problem is not that we don’t have enough laws, it’s that the government is not enforcing the laws we have now, so passing more legislation is not the immediate solution.”
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