With the Senate apparently within days or hours of passing the so-called Gang of Eight\u2019s immigration reform bill, one opponent of that bill has offered an amendment to that legislation that would prevent it from becoming another tool of totalitarianism.<\/p>\n
On June 20, Senator Rand Paul (shown, R-Ky.) announced on his website<\/a> that he would introduce the Protect Our Privacy Act as an amendment to S. 744, the Border Security, Economic Opportunity, and Immigration Modernization Act.<\/p>\n According to Paul, his measure would prohibit the issuance of a national ID card. The constitutionally consistent freshman senator believes that his proposed amendment would push back against the assault on liberty being perpetrated by the Obama administration.<\/p>\n “A National ID card violates our right to privacy by helping to consolidate data and facilitate the government in the tracking of individuals.\u00a0President Ronald Reagan opposed this idea, as did President Bill Clinton.\u00a0They believed, as I do, that American citizens should not be forced to carry around a National Identification Card as a condition of citizenship, because the card offends any reasonable basic concept of freedom. While\u00a0identifying and documenting immigrants is necessary for proper reform, implementing a mandatory identification registry for all citizens is not,” Paul said.<\/p>\n Senator Paul\u2019s statement provides the following points relating to the protections proposed by his amendment.<\/p>\n The Protect Our Privacy Act does the following:<\/p>\n – Prohibits the Department of Homeland Security from interpreting the immigration reform bill to permit a national identification card or system;<\/p>\n – Prohibits the Federal or State government from requiring photographs or biometric information without probable cause;<\/p>\n – Prevents the provision in the bill titled “Photo Tool” from allowing the government to force all citizens to provide a photo;<\/p>\n – Prohibits a “biometric social security card” for citizens; and,<\/p>\n – Forbids a “de facto national registry of citizens.”<\/p>\n In an op-ed published by Politico<\/a>, Senator Paul explained his impending \u201cno\u201d vote on the immigration overhaul:<\/p>\n I will be voting no on the Senate’s Gang of Eight immigration bill, because the legislation does not secure the border first.<\/p>\n I think we desperately need immigration reform. Unfortunately, this legislation does not give us serious reform.<\/p>\n Of paramount concern is what to do with the 12 million people currently residing in the U.S. who are in legal limbo: No one is seriously contemplating they leave, but conservatives believe normalizing their status should be dependent on border security first.<\/p>\n Any immigration reform must expand legal immigration and the work visa program, so we don’t find another 12 million undocumented workers here a decade from now. The Gang of Eight bill actually decreases the number of agricultural workers visas. If work visas are less than what the market demands, the workers will come illegally and we’re right back where we started.<\/p>\n On May 24, Senator Paul published a similar opinion piece in the Washington Times<\/em><\/a>. Paul wrote:<\/p>\n The controversial immigration-reform bill that passed the Senate Judiciary Committee this week is expected to be considered by the Senate in June. Many see measures contained in this bill, such as a strong E-Verify and a \u201cphoto tool,\u201d as a means to control unlawful immigrants\u2019 access to unlawful employment. I worry that they go too far.<\/p>\n I think there are better ideas that err on the side of individual privacy while still strengthening our borders. We should scrap a national identification database and pass immigration reform that secures the border, expands existing work-visa programs and prevents noncitizens from access to welfare. These simple ideas will eliminate the perceived need for an invasive worker-verification system and a government citizenship database.<\/p>\n I am against the idea that American citizens should be forced to carry around a National Identification Card as a condition of citizenship. I worry that the Senate is working to consider a series of little-noticed provisions in comprehensive immigration reform that may provide a pathway to a national ID card for all individuals present in the United States \u2013 citizens and noncitizens. These draconian ideas would simply give government too much power.<\/p>\n Forcing Americans to carry around an identification card to affirmatively prove citizenship offends our basic concept of freedom. Wanting to avoid a \u201cpapers please\u201d culture in our country is also why conservatives oppose federal universal gun background checks. We oppose such measures not because we don\u2019t believe in common-sense rules or regulation \u2013 but because we are wary of giving the federal government this kind of centralized power over our daily lives.<\/p>\n I am against government lists of those who own or have transferred a firearm for the same reason I oppose any pathway to a national ID. I don\u2019t think that government should have the awesome power of monitoring the legal activities of American citizens. That is not a proper role of the federal government \u2013 or any level of government, for that matter.<\/p>\n As with his other amendments to the immigration bill, Paul is blocking every effort by his colleagues in Congress to deprive Americans of their most basic civil rights as protected by the Constitution.<\/p>\n In the Politico letter, Senator Paul places the onus for real immigration reform on the shoulders of the House of Representatives.<\/p>\n The authors of the current bill gloss over these core immigration issues by saying they will simply put more people on the border. This is like using a Band-Aid to cure a cold, and further shows Washington’s ignorance of the deep systematic flaws that have contributed to our immigration dilemma.<\/p>\n It is now up to the House to champion real immigration reform. If we’re going to fix our broken borders and have an overhaul of the system verifiable by Congress, the House will have to lead the way.<\/p>\n The New York Times<\/em> reported on Tuesday, June 25<\/a>, that House Republicans \u201cfeel no pressure to act quickly\u201d on the immigration issue.<\/p>\n \u201cWe have a minority of the minority in the Senate voting for this bill,\u201d the Times<\/em> quotes Representative Tom Cole (R-Okla.), referring to the 15 members of the GOP likely to vote in favor of the measure when the Senate votes this week.<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s not going to put a lot of pressure on the majority of the majority in the House,\u201d Cole said, as reported by the Times<\/em>.<\/p>\n Finally, as The New American<\/em> has repeatedly pointed out throughout the debate on the immigration issue over the past few years, Congress is not empowered by the Constitution to legislate in the arena of immigration.<\/p>\n