A Chance to End Bonanza for Illegals

By vetoing a ridiculous bill passed by the Legislature, Gov. Pete Wilson might start a process that will end the hypocrisy permeating this nation’s treatment of illegal immigrants.

The bill slipped through the Legislature on June 6 with almost no debate. It would reverse a recent court ruling and again allow illegal immigrants to get low-cost, publicly subsidized education at California universities and colleges.

The measure was designated as an emergency bill, which means it will become effective immediately unless Wilson vetoes it.

If he doesn’t, foreigners here illegally will be able to resume their status as “residents” of this state and pay only about $1,700 a year for classes at the universities and less than that at colleges. They can even get state aid to finance their education.

One particularly galling aspect of the measure is that it continues to require those who are in the United States legally but come from other states to pay the high non-resident fees that average nearly $7,500 a year at the universities.

University officials won’t even estimate how many illegals get the tax subsidy, although they admit that many do. However, plaintiffs in the lawsuit that stopped the practice estimated that taxpayers put up about $1 million a year to help finance the higher education of illegals.

Only a relatively few illegals get the tax subsidy, but it is only one of a host of other, much more costly benefits ranging from free health care to jobless insurance that serve to entice foreigners to slip into this country illegally.

The governor has until Friday to veto the quirky measure. He should--because it is unfair to others who live in this country legally but are not California residents.

A veto could signal a growing awareness of the need for federal, state and local governments to stop the contradictory practice of offering benefits to illegals even though they are deported if they are apprehended. Not only that, but also under the 1986 Immigration Reform Act, employers who knowingly hire them face large fines and even imprisonment for the first time in U.S. history.

One ironic case involving the education subsidy is that of Kathy Nelson, daughter of Alan Nelson, former head of the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service. She wanted to go to UCLA and pay the lower costs charged California residents.

But UCLA officials decided that Kathy Nelson was a “non-resident” because she and her family had moved to Washington temporarily so her father could take charge of the nation’s immigration service. She was ordered to pay the high non-resident university fees even though the family continued to pay California taxes, voted and maintained a home here.

Alan Nelson was infuriated, and after prolonged bureaucratic battles, his daughter was finally reclassified as a California resident and allowed to pay the same lower fees the university charged illegal immigrants.

Also disgusted by the practice was a UCLA employee, David Bradford, whose job was processing student admission applications and determining whether they were California residents.

Bradford was ordered by UCLA to resign when he refused to enroll illegal immigrants as students--which, he said, required him to ignore federal immigration laws. He filed a suit charging that UCLA policy on illegals was itself illegal and that he had been wrongfully discharged.

The courts agreed with Bradford and outlawed the UCLA practice that the Legislature wants to restore. His wrongful-discharge case is pending.

Wilson may veto the latest bill by Assemblyman Richard Polanco (D-Los Angeles) to subsidize illegal immigrants. But the university issue is only a small facet of the broader illegal alien problem that we approach in such a schizophrenic manner.

On the one hand, Congress passed the Immigration Reform Act that allowed nearly 3 million illegal immigrants to remain here legally, but it also decided to impose penalties on employers who hire those still here, or coming here, illegally.

On the other hand, almost nothing was done to stop enticing foreigners to come here illegally by allowing them to get such things as government-assisted education, free or low-cost medical care and help in finding jobs and welfare or unemployment benefits if they don’t get work.

Despite such confusing contradictions, the Immigration Reform Act worked surprisingly well at first, largely because employers looking for cheap foreign labor didn’t want to risk fines or imprisonment. The number of illegals entering the country was cut in half.

But the numbers grew again as foreigners began to realize that their chances of being apprehended are negligible once they are here and employers figured that they also are unlikely to be caught.

Even so, there are still far fewer apprehensions of illegals now than before the law was passed, and it will be far more effective if it is more rigorously enforced and we don’t continue to entice them here by benefits such as the education bonanza that Wilson should veto.

Some militant immigrant rights organizations, such as the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, are urging Wilson to sign the measure, but they want far more.

They want Congress to adopt an “open border” policy that would allow foreigners, especially Mexicans, to come into this country without restrictions, just as President Bush wants to do for goods made in Mexico under a proposed U.S.-Mexico free trade agreement.

The agreement would be a disaster for many U.S. workers who already face tough job competition from the cheap labor of illegal immigrants.

And that competition will intensify if “free trade” becomes a reality.

Wilson cannot do anything about the “open border” nonsense, but his veto of the education bill for illegals might stimulate other cuts in the many incentives we offer them to come here in defiance of our immigration laws.