2 Legislators Call for Cutting Off Quake Aid to Illegal Immigrants : Politics: Critics immediately condemn the suggestion by Rep. Dana Rohrabacher and Assemblyman Pat Nolan as racially motivated.

The politically charged issue of immigration was tossed onto already complex earthquake relief efforts Friday, when two Republican legislators from Southern California publicly called on federal and state authorities to cut off assistance to illegal immigrants.

Critics immediately condemned the officeholders’ suggestion as the latest eruption of immigrant-bashing and political manipulation of the immigration issue.

Since the earthquake, state and federal authorities have stated repeatedly that victims are eligible for most emergency assistance regardless of their immigration status. And U.S. officials have pledged publicly that immigration agents will not raid relief centers or otherwise seek out illegal immigrants looking for aid.

Those assurances have enraged U.S. Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Huntington Beach) and Assemblyman Pat Nolan (R-Glendale), who said officials should be checking assistance stations and deporting those who are here illegally--not encouraging them to apply for grants and loans.

“They should be relocated back to their home country--that’s a humanitarian thing,” said Nolan, who introduced a bill Friday that would cut off state assistance to unlawful residents.

Illegal immigrants queuing up for aid are blocking help meant for U.S. citizens and lawful immigrants, the two legislators charged. Although they say they do not object to illegal immigrants receiving short-term emergency aid, the pair opposes more long-term help, such as funds to cover moving costs and months of rent.

“I want the people of California to understand that hundreds of millions of dollars that should be going to them is instead going to illegal aliens, and it’s absolutely outrageous,” said Rohrabacher, who added that he plans to sponsor a federal budget amendment next week excluding illegal immigrants. “Once people realize that there is free money available, the lines will be never-ending and will reach to every border.”

Despite their assertions, both Rohrabacher and Nolan acknowledged that they have no idea how many illegal immigrants are receiving disaster funds.

The issue of post-quake assistance to illegal immigrants has turned up periodically on radio call-in shows and elsewhere, but Friday’s comments marked the first large-scale public linkage of earthquake relief with people’s immigration status.

The two legislators made their declarations at a news conference staged across the street from a county office in Glendale where hundreds of earthquake victims--many of them immigrants--were lining up for food stamps. Some had waited in line 10 hours or more.

“When I walked down the street, I didn’t hear anyone speaking English,” Rohrabacher said.

Both he and Nolan were quick to dismiss suggestions that their campaign might be racially motivated. “I love my fellow human beings,” Rohrabacher said.

Three area women--an African American, a Korean American and a Spanish American--were invited to speak in support of the legislators.

“We have to take care of our own people first, before we go out and take care of people who are here illegally and who come to milk the system,” said Celeste Greig, a naturalized U.S. citizen from Spain.

Detractors were quick to condemn the legislators’ proposal as another effort to score points at the expense of a poor and politically powerless population.

An emergency “is not the time to be pulling this kind of stunt,” said Angelo Ancheta, executive director of the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles.

Calling the suggestions “mean-spirited,” Assemblyman Richard Polanco (D-Los Angeles) noted that the United States annually provides millions in disaster relief overseas. “How ironic that these legislators would turn their backs on people living on our own American soil, simply because it’s the politically popular thing to do,” Polanco said.

Meanwhile, federal and state officials declined to embrace the Rohrabacher and Nolan proposals.

Terry Hamlin, a spokesman for the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the principal coordinator of disaster aid, declined to comment on the suggestion. But he noted that federal law currently prohibits officials from refusing disaster assistance because of citizenship or place of origin.

Gov. Pete Wilson, who has charged that health and education benefits draw illegal immigrants to California, is nonetheless against excluding the undocumented from post-quake relief rolls, a spokesman said. “Clearly, earthquakes are not an incentive for people to come to California,” said Kevin Eckery, the governor’s press secretary.