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Tom Tancredo on Immigration
This candidate has withdrawn from the election
If you're in this country illegally, the penalty, yes, is deportation. And there are easier ways to handle it. We can by attrition, that is, not giving people jobs if they're here illegally. Millions will return home voluntarily. Others that don't, you have to deport. Because you know why? It is the law. Mr. President, hello. It's the law. Do you understand those words?
Tancredo has resisted any approach that could provide a path to citizenship for immigrants who fulfill various requirements.
Tancredo said an illegal alien serving in the military should be placed on a path to citizenship, but all other undocumented citizens must return to their former home.
[Tancredo] supports denying citizenship to American-born children of illegal immigrants.
When people say to me, and they do all the time, I hear this constantly...people go up, and tell me, they go, "Hey listen, what are you going to do with all the people who are presently in the country illegally? There’s 15 to 20 million - you can't deport them." And then they go on. Right. And I say "Hold it! Why not?" [laughter] I mean, why not? Now, you may not want to. You may have political reasons why it's difficult. You will see every single night on television somebody's family being torn apart somebody, you know...all that's true. But don't just go - don't make that leap and go, "Well, you can't deport them." Because you can. Heh-heh. It is the truth, you can. We could do that. Now we may certainly choose not to, and there are other options that are probably even easier.
Why would any immigrant come here through the front door when the backdoor is wide open? When you come here legally as a guest worker, you're constrained by how long you can stay, you have to pay fees and fill out paperwork, etc. So without secure borders, the path of least resistance is coming here illegally.
Tancredo said Bush's guest-worker proposal is "a pig with lipstick."
Tancredo says he doesn't oppose a guest worker program in theory but that border security must come first.
You are asking about if a fence is really going to stop people coming into the United States illegally? No, not by itself, it won't. What is does, of course, is to redirect the flow of people coming through. They will move in different directions and that is when you put human resources in the gaps, so to speak. It will not in it of itself stop. It a the fence, it is the human resources you put behind it, and it is the other kind of technology, especially the use of drones and other things that will combine together to actually support our border.
Voted YES on the construction of a 700-mile fence along the US-Mexican border
"The legislators who are behind the effort to make New Hampshire a sanctuary state demonstrate an absolute disregard for the safety of their citizens and also for the rule of law," Tancredo said, "Sanctuary policies are a violation of federal law and cities and states that declare themselves such, welcome into their communities a criminal element."
I attached an amendment to the Homeland Security Appropriations Bill saying that no funds can be used for any city that is a sanctuary city...they shouldn't be getting a dime.
Not a penny more for cities like this [sanctuary cities], and there are several of them like this.
Sponsored the Amendment to prevent State and local governments who refuse to share information with Federal immigration authorities from obtaining Federal funds under the Homeland Security Appropriations Act.
Rep. Tancredo voted YES on the Marshall Amendment to H.R. 5441, the fiscal year 2007 Department of Homeland Security (DHS) appropriations bill. The Marshall Amendment would fund USCIS electronic employment eligibility verification program.
Q: As president, what is the first thing you would do? TANCREDO: I'd turn to my Attorney General and tell him that he should begin a vigorous enforcement of the law against hiring people who are here illegally. Employers who are violating the law I'd want to be one of the top priorities
Q: What do you see as the most effective enforcement type tools that can stem this surge [of illegal aliens]? TANCREDO: Employer sanctions, undeniably. Employers today create the magnet that draws millions of people into the country illegally. The fact that we do nothing about it encourages, of course, more people to do it, which continues the circle. Q: So going after the employers, then, leaves this pool of illegal immigrants facing a decision of work or go home? TANCREDO: Correct. That's it, if they can't get a job, they really don't have many other options. If you came here for a job, then the thing for which you came is not available, large numbers will go home. I don't know how many. Then, those who don't go home you have to deport because that's the law.
In response to some Mayors that do not want the fence going through their towns, Tancredo remarked: "Congress approved the border fence with the overwhelming support of the American people to protect our nation from terrorists and illegal aliens and it will not be thwarted by a handful of rogue mayors...Build the border fence north of these communities."
"Bilingual countries don't work...English is the language of this country."
"This is a test [immigration] to see our willingness to actually hold together as a nation...We are testing our willingness to actually to hold onto something called the English language - something that is the glue that is supposed to hold us together as a nation."