Rep. Don Young (R-AK)
Rep. Don Young (R-AK) set off a media firestorm for his use of the offensive term “wetbacks” to describe immigrant workers. He has since apologized and said that he supports immigration reform.
But Young’s words aren’t the only thing he should apologize for. Throughout his career in Congress, he has repeatedly taken votes that harm the lives of undocumented immigrants and make it more difficult to achieve comprehensive immigration reform. Here’s a list of some of the worst votes:
- He voted YES in August of 1996 to make English the official language of the United States
- He voted YES in March of 1996 for an amendment that would’ve denied public education to undocumented workers
- He FAILED TO VOTE for HR 3722, which would’ve denied hospitals federal funds for emergency care for undocumented immigrants unless they turned over certain private information on immigrants.
- He voted NO on the DREAM Act of 2010 which would’ve provided a path to citizenship for qualified undocumented young people.
- He has voted to support E-Verify, the flawed program used by the federal government to monitor the status of undocumented immigrant workers.
- He has co-sponsored a bill to deny Social Security benefits to undocumented immigrants who have worked hard and paid into the system.
Congressman Young was right to apologize for his remarks, but if he truly supports comprehensive immigration reform he must back off his previous votes as well and support humane reforms.
E-Verify is a system that needs to work & needs to be in place for the future so we don’t have this same problem every twenty years or so…As for Social Security if you are not a U.S. citizen & are here illegally working then you should not be able to collect those dollars & in fact if the above were working you would not be paying them in the first place. I am 100% for fixing the broken system we now have but lets be honest here & not have to have every Federal document written so a hundred people from a hundred places can read it… There is nothing wrong with having everything written in English….Lastly the ability to come across the border, have a child who is automatically a citizen also has to stop… That law was made when everyone coming here came from elsewhere, today we have more then enough people to not need millions more coming in to work when there is not enough work for the people already here…We need to understand that the people coming across the border tomorrow take the jobs of the people who came across yesterday…