Republican lawmakers vote with Democrats to give lower tuition rates to illegal aliens than Americans in Georgia

Immigration Politics - A pro-enforcement View, Politics

Written And Submitted By D.A. King

 

House panel advances HB 120 out of committee

Dalton Republican Kasey Carpenter

A Republican-controlled Gold Dome committee has voted to advance legislation that would give illegal aliens lower tuition rates in Georgia than Americans and legal immigrants from most other states. 

The bill, HB 120, was sponsored in the legislature by Dalton Republican Kasey Carpenter and has more Democrat cosigners than Republicans. Pro-enforcement opponents of the legislation began furious calls and emails to their legislators and Republican Speaker of the House Rep. David Ralston soon after the approval.

 

Advanced out of the twenty-five member House Higher Education Committee Thursday, the illegal alien friendly measure passed by a vote of 16-4, with

Committee Chairman Chuck Martin (R- Alpharetta)

 several Republican panel members staying away from the hearing. Committee Chairman Chuck Martin (R- Alpharetta) was clearly a proponent of the bill

 and openly worked to adjust language to help future “undocumented workers” get a new, lower tuition deal in Georgia’s public universities and the state’s technical college system.

Rome Republican Katie Dempsey

A notable “yes” vote came from Rome 

Republican Katie Dempsey who seems to have experienced a liberal evolution since 2011 when she was a co-sponsor of the widely publicized, pro-enforcement ‘Illegal Immigration Reform and Enforcement Act of 2011’ (HB87).

“Voting with the Democrats to give special treatment to illegal aliens over Americans is not what we sent Republicans to Atlanta for” said one angry Rome GOP voter who wished to remain unnamed for fear of local reprisals.

The bill proposes to change state law so as to reward illegal aliens with deferred action on deportation with wording that would allow them to pay no more than 110 percent higher tuition rates than the instate rate. Currently illegal aliens in Georgia must pay out-of-state tuition that is three to four times higher than the instate amount.

 

Before he voted “yes” with the Democrats, Rep. Bert Reeves thanked the sponsor for his “courage” 

Rep. Bert Reeves

in proposing the bill to help the effected illegals. Reeves also cited what he claimed were “unfair” attacks and “blatant lies” involved in the already widespread opposition to Carpenter’s illegal alien bill.

Reeves is not listed as a cosigner on HB 120. Powerful business interests who seek more affordable foreign labor are pushing the legislation.

Gold Dome watchers note that Carpenter has repeatedly presented his bill as applying only to illegal aliens who are beneficiaries of former President Barack Obama’s “DACA” program. Despite media reports, none of the previous versions of his bill actually contained any reference to DACA. The current version approved by the House panel does in fact limit the new lower tuition rate to DACA recipients. But it also says “nothing in this Code section shall be construed to require in-state tuition classification for individuals not lawfully present in Georgia.” 

The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and a federal appellate court have both made it clear that illegal aliens with DACA status are nevertheless illegal aliens and do not have legal status or “lawful presence.”

In March 2019 The United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit ruled against a group of DACA recipients who claimed “lawful presence” for admission purposes in Georgia’s university system. As reported by the liberal Atlanta Journal – Constitution newspaper, that court said “as DACA recipients, they simply were given a reprieve from potential removal; that does not mean they are in any way ‘lawfully present under the (INA) act.”

It is not clear if this legal information has made its way to Georgia legislators or if Republican Gov. Brian Kemp would sign a bill into law that insures illegal aliens pay less tuition in Georgia’s post secondary education system than Americans and legal immigrants living in other states.

U.S. Department of Homeland Security estimates are that Georgia is home to more illegal aliens than Arizona.

The bill can be read on the General Assembly website. The House committee vote record can be seen in a post on ImmigrationPoliticsGA.com.  Contact information for individual Georgia House Reps can be found on the legislature’s official website. Speaker Ralston’s office phone is 404-656-5020.

Having passed out of the Higher Education Committee HB 120 must be approved in the Rules committee and then be voted on by a majority of members in the full Republican-controlled House chamber before midnight, Monday, March 8, which is known as “Crossover Day.”

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D.A. King is president of the Dustin Inman Society and proprietor of ImmigrationPoliticsGa.com. He is not a member of any political party.

 

D.A. King: Negative review of Rep Kasey Carpenter’s illegal alien instate tuition bill – HB 120

Immigration Politics - A pro-enforcement View

Written And Submitted By D.A. King

 

Americans and legal immigrants from most other states would pay higher tuition

It was amazing to see that none of the legislators seemed to note or care that neither “DACA” nor “DACA recipient” appear anywhere in the Carpenter’s tuition amnesty bill. 

 

State Rep Kasey Carpenter (R- Dalton) presented the latest version of his legislation to grant instate tuition to illegal aliens in the House Higher Education Committee last Friday morning. He was on Zoom from in his car parked “on the side of the road” somewhere between the Gold Dome and Oklahoma. He was retrieving flour for one of his restaurants. 

It got wackier from there. 

Carpenter’s opener was to assure all concerned that his legislation rewarding illegal aliens with lower tuition rates than Americans or legal immigrants from most other states pay  “is not a bill about immigration.” He went on to outline HB 120 with “all right, so what this bill does, is it, it, it basically allows DACA students that are in Georgia, they graduated from a Georgia high school, to attend certain colleges and universities in the, in the college system, at an in-state tuition rate.” 

‘DACA’ is the acronym for the 2012 Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals policy put in place by then candidate for reelection, President Barack Obama. The action being deferred is deportation proceedings.

State Rep Kasey Carpenter (R- Dalton)

It was more than a little amusing to watch Carpenter pepper his online sales pitch with the terms “DACA” and “DACA recipients” as well as in the resulting Q&A with gushing Democrat committee members who had only praise for the concept in their questions. It was equally entertaining to see the long line of witnesses – one who is currently a DACA recipient and one who was – stand up in support of the bill inserting the “DACA recipient” term into their testimony.

It was amazing to see that none of the legislators seemed to note or care that neither “DACA” nor “DACA recipient” appear anywhere in the Carpenter’s tuition amnesty bill. 

The entire event would only have been slightly more comical if Rep Carpenter had taken the time to hawk his bill dressed in a wide striped suit with a wink and grin from a used car lot with balloons and a megaphone.

In the current version of his proposed law, Carpenter does have wording that permits illegal aliens to pay less tuition than Americans if they meet “the eligibility criteria set by the United States Department of Homeland Security for deferred action in enforcement of federal immigration laws.”  Italics mine. 

But, there doesn’t seem to be set eligibility criteria for deferred action on enforcement – it is a discretionary tradition in federal law enforcement and (like DACA) not a result of congressional action. Lines 34 & 35 in HB 120 would be laughed out of a well-informed committee. ‘Journalists’ should not be running stories that report HB 120 somehow applies to “DACA recipients.” It doesn’t. 

Deferred action is not DACA.  Sometimes it is difficult to decide if things that are just plain screwy are a result of ignorance or intent. Deferred action on immigration enforcement is outside of DACA. How far outside? John Lennon obtained deferred action on immigration enforcement in the 1970’s. 

All co-signers are not visible online, but at last check with the House clerk’s office, Carpenter’s instate tuition bill has more Democrat cosponsors than Republicans.

As is, HB120 is a hustle that is fully dependent on the oversupply of immigration ignorance on the part of most of the legislators who govern a state with more “undocumented workers” than live in Arizona. This writer started working with state lawmakers on drafting and perfecting illegal immigration legislation in 2005. HB 120 would not have been allowed a hearing in a Republican – run committee ten years ago. 

We were happy to post a very critical analysis of the debut of HB120 along with facts the media is suppressing and fully expected to see changes in the bill as a result. 

None of the above is intended to indicate certainty that the bill won’t be passed out of the House Higher Education Committee and onto the floor. 

I got a sense of the determination to advance the bill in an early morning discussion with the committee Chairman Chuck Martin (R- Alpharetta) in his office when my request for a copy of any committee substitute language was first dodged then tacitly refused. 

 

Read HB 120 for yourself

 

The Committee Substitute version presented on Feb 19, 2021 in the Higher Education Committee is not online and will not be posted on the House website unless it is passed out. I have scanned in and posted the paper version (with my scribbled notes) I was given by a friend who was able to get a copy from the Chairman’s staffers.

Here is a link to the original language.  A Fiscal note for HB 120 is available here.  

We have posted a link to the official video of the entire Friday hearing and a transcript of Rep Carpenter’s presentation on the Dustin Inman Society website. Contact information for Rep Carpenter here.

Space does not allow a list of all the problems with HB 120. But it should be mentioned that ‘DACA recipients’ are nevertheless illegal aliens according to the United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit. Even the liberal AJC reported that one.

D.A. King is president of the Dustin Inman Society

Kasey Carpenter’s bill to Give In-State Tuition For Illegal Aliens (HB120)

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Voice your opinion!  Call the Republican legislators of the Higher Education Committee today or early Friday morning and let them know your views.
   link to HB120
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