Curb on U.S. Citizenship Proposed : Welfare: Simi Valley’s Rep. Gallegly urges a constitutional amendment to deny status to children born in this country to those who are not legal residents.

Rep. Elton Gallegly (R-Simi Valley) has proposed a constitutional amendment that would deny U.S. citizenship to children born in this country of illegal immigrants.

Gallegly, in legislation introduced Tuesday, proposed that only children born to mothers who are citizens or legal residents be granted citizenship--a move that he said would save taxpayers billions of dollars a year in welfare payments.

“The bottom line, when you look at the costs for childbirth (for babies of illegal immigrants) and for payments to them afterward, is that all the other needy children . . . are being deprived,” said Gallegly, who represents portions of Ventura County and the San Fernando Valley.

The new bill prompted harsh criticism from Latino rights activists, who said Gallegly is pandering to voters in his largely white, middle-class district by proposing a constitutional amendment that has no chance of passing.

“It’s the type of politics of race that has been practiced by . . . Jesse Helms and George Bush,” said Marco Antonio Abarca, a California Rural Legal Assistance lawyer in Oxnard. “But racial polarization is good politics. It wins.”

Abarca noted that Gallegly, a three-term congressman, does not sit on the House Judiciary Committee, which considers immigration bills.

“In the world of immigration he is a nobody,” Abarca said, “but he does this to preach to the converted.”

Gallegly said he proposed the bill because the nation desperately needs to cut its budget and that billions of dollars can be saved by eliminating social services for children of illegal immigrants.

Those children, he said, would be treated as other illegal residents--given due process in court and deported.

But the congressman acknowledged that his bill has little chance of receiving the required two-thirds vote of Congress and ratification by three-fourths of the states.

“Two-thirds of the House are Democrats, so it’s very difficult for conservatives, for Republicans to get almost anything through,” he said. “But that doesn’t mean we don’t have a responsibility to stand up and be counted.”

The proposed amendment is Gallegly’s latest initiative aimed at illegal immigrants. Earlier this month, he announced a package of five bills he said were designed to help the United States gain control of its borders.

Gallegly, who has estimated that indigent illegal immigrants receive $5.4 billion a year in social services nationwide, said his constitutional amendment would benefit Los Angeles County enormously.

Using figures he said were provided by Los Angeles County, he said that $277 million a year is paid to children of illegal immigrants or those who are legal residents under the 1986 federal amnesty program. County officials confirmed the figures.