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I’ll wash your car if you remind Gov Brian Kemp about illegal aliens in Georgia – Reposted from The Islander newspaper

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The below is reposted here from the St. Simons Island/Brunswick “The Islander” newspaper, Sept 19, 2022 edition

I’ll wash your car if you remind Gov Kemp about illegal aliens in Georgia

D.A. King

With the “Brian Kemp Track and Deport Plan,” then candidate for governor, Brian Kemp made a detailed 2018 promise to go after what he called “criminal illegals” in Georgia if he was elected. He went so far as to post detailed language of promised legislation on his campaign website that he said would create a public registry of the criminal aliens and end “sanctuary cities” in Georgia.

You can see an example of this pledge in a short video blurb from a May, 2018 Fox & Friends interview on the ImmigrationPolitcsGA.com website. There was no such legislation in Kemp’s first term.

* Related: 2018 candidate for GA governor Brian Kemp’s first TV campaign ad 

In an October 2021 news report (“Kemp’s immigration policy could complicate bid for second term”), even the uber liberal Atlanta Journal Constitution took note of the Kemp’s betrayal with “Gov. Brian Kemp promised to enact sweeping crackdowns on illegal immigration on the 2018 campaign trail, boasting that he would “round up criminal illegals” himself as he pledged to “track and immediately deport” unauthorized immigrants with criminal records. Those unfulfilled vows now complicate Kemp’s campaign for a second term.” Indeed.

This writer is brilliantly aware of the fact that pointing out Gov Brian Kemp’s defiance on the many 2018 campaign promises he made regarding “undocumented workers” makes Republican voters uncomfortable. I have been told more than once to remain silent on the matter lest too many GOP voters remember too much from four years ago. I can’t count the times I have heard various versions of “we don’t want Stacey to win, D.A. – lay off Kemp until after the election!”

No.

For the record, I watched Stacey Abrams in the state legislature up close for many years and certainly don’t want her to be governor either. But the fact is that the “criminal illegals” Brian Kemp ran on in 2018 are still killing, raping, and molesting innocents in Georgia while he remains silent and boasts of Georgia being “number one for business.”

Other pro-enforcement Americans have taken note of Kemp’s “big truck trick.”

Tom Homan, former acting director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in the Trump administration, on Fox News in February, 2020: ”I’m in Georgia today, I’m giving a speech in Atlanta. Governor Kemp, who ran on tough immigration enforcement, now he’s in office, he’s missing in action. Sanctuary jurisdictions are growing in Georgia. So, you know, again, it’s the politicians who aren’t living up to their word.” Homan was in Georgia to be the keynote speaker at a forum on immigration this writer organized.

Closer to home for The Islander readers, we point out a letter to the editor published in the Brunswick News in March which read in part “by order of the powerful special interests that profit from black-market labor, the entire topic of the organized crime of illegal immigration has been carefully set aside here in the Peach State where we host more illegals than Arizona” wrote Mr. Robert Trent.

A resident of St. Mary’s, Trent is a proud former immigration enforcement officer and former Border Patrol agent. Now retired, his final assignment was serving as the as Assistant Director, Enforcement Training, at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center in Glynn County.

“I am one of the many pro-enforcement voters who can remember all the way back to 2018 when then candidate for Governor Brian Kemp made a long list of promises concerning “criminal illegals,” his “big truck” and detailed legislation aimed at sanctuary cities and counties in Georgia. I am also old enough to see his arrogant refusal to so much as mention those promises since then” wrote Mr. Trent.

Solution

The solution to the Kemp betrayal on illegal immigration in Georgia does not involve ignoring it. In politics, silence is consent. Georgia Republicans should join Tom Homan and Bob Trent in making their voices heard by 2022 candidate for governor Brian Kemp about illegal immigration in Georgia.

I’ll wash your car if you call his Capitol office in Atlanta and speak up. The phone number is 404-656-1776.

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Complaints filed with Georgia Office of Inspector General against Gov Brian Kemp, Gwinnett Sheriff Keybo Taylor & Cobb Sheriff Craig D. Owens – OCGA 42-4-14

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Complaints filed (Sept. 6, 2022) related to multiple violations of OCGA 42-4-14 and the violations of the oaths of office for Gov. Brian Kemp, Sheriff Keybo Taylor and Sheriff Craig Owens. There will be additional complaints filed. See this letter for explanation and links to evidence.

OIG here.

  • Updated Sept. 9, 2022: Initial response and my reply here.
  • Final response from OIG on the two complaints against the sheriffs here.
  • List of news outlets, editors, producers and reporters to whom we have sent a news tip on this story here. 
Kemp complaint confirmation.

 

Taylor complaint confirmation.
Owens complaint confirmation.

What countries send the most (legal) immigrants to Georgia?

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August 22, 2022

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Photo not from Rome News Tribune story.

Biggest sources of immigrants to Georgia

The fifty top nations

“Over 14% of the United States population is composed of immigrants. But in reality, the vast majority of Americans today are here because of relatives who immigrated from other countries some time in the last several hundred years.

And while the distinctive American culture and spirit is the result of blending many diverse cultures and histories, the United States has for centuries had an up-and-down relationship with immigration.

Each era of immigration has been met with reductive ideas and resistance, whether the backlash was directed toward the Chinese, Irish, Italians, or Mexicans. Immigration laws have targeted specific groups at various times, stoking intolerance and preventing people from truly joining American society. Over time, however, as laws changed to be more equitable and immigrants found their footings, we have reaped the rewards of innovation in business, music, art, literature, dance, food, societal norms, entertainment, and sports—all while realizing a greater understanding of and respect for different cultures, religions, and ideas.

Stacker compiled a list of the biggest sources of immigrants to Georgia using data from the . Countries are ranked by the highest number of residents according to 2020 5-year estimates. Keep reading to find out more about the immigrant community in your home state.”

  • Click here then scroll to the bottom to save time.

 

Georgia Chamber of Commerce CEO and president Chris Clark: More visas, amnesty and instate tuition for illegal aliens with DACA among his organization’s top legislative priorities

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    • Update: Aug 20, 2022: Half of US companies gearing up for layoffs, survey suggests

      WABE (NPR)

      Is there a bipartisan fix to Georgia’s labor woes?

      Georgia Chamber CEO Chris Clark (right) moderates a discussion between Georgia U.S. Reps. Carolyn Bourdeaux (center) and Rick Allen. (Emil Moffatt/WABE)

      Georgia’s congressional delegation remains deeply divided, politically, but they are in agreement on one thing: the state needs more workers.

      Members of congress from both parties spoke Tuesday in Macon, in an event hosted by the Georgia Chamber.

      Republican Rep. Buddy Carter, who represents the state’s 1stCongressional District, says Georgia’s worker shortage is not hard to miss.

      “Ride down the road, you see ‘Help Wanted’ signs everywhere,” Carter said. “You see businesses closing early and cutting back on their business hours because they don’t have the help.”

      Rep. Carolyn Bourdeaux, a Democrat, says a significant reason for this labor shortage is the steep drop in immigration over the last six year…

      Read there entire report from the liberal WABE News here.

       

 

How ‘Immigrant Communities’ Beat Back ICE and Helped Flip Georgia #GLAHR

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Dec 10, 2020

Boltsmag.org

Growing up in Gwinnett County, Georgia, in the northeastern Atlanta suburbs, Jonathan Zuñiga remembers the fear his parents felt driving to the grocery store.

In 2009, the Gwinnett County sheriff’s office, under Sheriff Butch Conway, started turning over hundreds of Latinx immigrants in its custody to ICE—including many who only landed in jail after police arrested them for minor traffic violations. Zuñiga says his parents, who are undocumented immigrants from Mexico, had to leave their construction jobs for lower-paying factory jobs that required less driving. But running errands continued to pose a threat.

“Driving even small amounts of time was unsafe,” Zuñiga said.

The county sheriff’s office was making these transfers because it had joined ICE’s 287(g) program, which allows local officers to directly enforce federal immigration policies, including screening immigration status and detaining residents until ICE takes custody. Gwinnett County operates one of the largest 287(g) programs in the country: this year, it ranks fourth in the nation for the number of ICE detainer requests, in which local jails hold people in custody longer in order to hand them over to federal agents. Detainers in Gwinnett peaked in 2012 and then steadily declined throughout Barack Obama’s second term as president. But they soared again after Donald Trump took office in early 2017 with new enforcement priorities, including having ICE arrest noncitizens more frequently for minor crimes. A Mother Jones investigation found that between 2017 and July 2019, the primary charge for nearly half of the people held for ICE at the Gwinnett County Jail was for driving without a license or another minor traffic violation.

But in November, voters in Gwinnett and nearby suburban Cobb County chose Democratic sheriffs for the first time in decades, electing candidates who made campaign promises to end the 287(g) programs. A Democratic candidate who opposed 287(g) also won in Charleston County, South Carolina; altogether these wins mirror a string of progressive sheriff victoriesin 2018 that were driven by immigration issues.

Cobb County’s longtime sheriff, Neil Warren, lost to challenger Craig Owens. In Gwinnett County, Sheriff-elect Keybo Taylor won with 57 percent of the vote against Republican candidate Lou Solis, the second-in-command to Conway, who didn’t seek re-election. In 2016, by contrast, Conway ran unopposed and won 97 percent of the vote.

That upset, and the emphasis on 287(g) as a central campaign issue in both counties, resulted in large part from the work of local immigrants’ rights organizers who have grown their operations under the Trump presidency and activated communities of color. Their organizing also contributed to Georgia electing a Democrat presidential candidate for the first time since 1992.

Leading up to the November elections, Zuñiga joined Georgia Latino Alliance for Human Rights (GLAHR) Action Network as a canvasser focused on the sheriff races in Gwinnett and Cobb counties. Working as part of the “Take Action, Get Power” coalition with Southerners on New Ground (SONG) Power, and Mijente, Zuñiga and other canvassers were able to reach more than 125,000 residences—primarily Latinx and Black voters—by door-knocking (with COVID-19 precautions), according to GLAHR. Their work paralleled groups like the Asian American Advocacy Fund, whose outreach helped to nearly double voter turnout among Asian American and Pacific Islander communities.

Zuñiga found that many residents were aware of 287(g) but not of how to change it. “They didn’t know the formal name of that policy, but they knew what could happen if [you didn’t have] a license,” he said. “A lot of people thought it was something coming down from the federal level. They weren’t aware that changing a sheriff could actually change that policy.”

Founded nearly 15 years ago, GLAHR is the largest Latinx grassroots organization in the state. Under the Trump administration, GLAHR, SONG, and other long-established Georgia-based nonprofits have joined a nationwide trend of changing liberal activism by creating 501(c)(4) arms—organizations that are also exempt from federal income tax but can lobby and do political work—in order to be more aggressive political players, rather than solely focused on litigation, educational work, or providing services.

  • Related reading: Led by GLAHR, May Day marchers say Georgia immigration laws unfair

Kevin Joachin, an organizer with GLAHR Action Network, says the organization’s priority has become “building the political consciousness of our community”—helping inform Latinx residents about specific policies and their ability to change them at a scale that has little precedence in Georgia, particularly for a down-ballot race. That organizing began early in the election cycle; GLAHR lead organizer Carlos Medina says that activating Latinx voters for the sheriff primaries helped push Democratic candidates in both counties leftward, leading to promises to end the 287(g) program.

Related reading: Communist banner unfurled at anti-borders GLAHR Gold Dome  

Zuñiga says he found that many Latinx and Black voters in the suburbs—particularly in the more rural areas of Cobb and Gwinnett counties—never before had an interaction with a canvasser, despite the influx of political spending and organizing that’s accompanied Georgia’s demographic change in recent years. “We try to get that small, little conversation with people because we feel like that actually matters,” Zuñiga said.

Although Hillary Clinton won Gwinnett County in the 2016 presidential election, and Joe Biden won the county and state this year, more than a third of Latinxes in Georgia voted for Trump, according to exit polls. Canvassers with Take Action Get Power found that some Latinx voters in Gwinnett supported Solis for sheriff partially because of his Latinx identity. Joachin says GLAHR Action Network’s in-person approach was pivotal: Canvassers would see pro-Solis signs in some stores and talk to the owners or employees about Gwinnett’s high rates of deportations. The next time canvassers drove by, Joachin said, the signs were gone. Compared to hyperpolarized debates about presidential candidates, Zuñiga says he was able to have “more in-touch conversations [about the sheriff’s race] because it was something that was affecting their communities, and they could see that firsthand.”

SONG volunteer coordinator Tayleece Paul says door-knocking yielded contact or conversations with 32 percent of residences, versus just 2 percent with phone banking. Paul grew up in Gwinnett County and remembers a friend’s father who was deported through the 287(g) program. Many of the coalition’s canvassers met people who had similar experiences with the program, she says. “Each person had their own unique story.”

Joachin says that engaging the entire Latinx community—including those who cannot vote, like undocumented immigrants—is central to GLAHR Action Network’s strategy of empowerment. “We’re not always concerned if the person who we’re looking for is at home, because maybe their family member who is undocumented will benefit from the conversation by being included,” he said. “We’re not telling them to vote—that’s voter fraud—but what we’re doing is creating a culture of voting.”   More here.

The Governor is the Chief Law Enforcement Officer in Georgia — Brian Kemp

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Governor’s Office

The governor is the chief executive of the state and oversees the executive branch. He or she is the chief law enforcement officer and the commander-in-chief of the state’s military forces.

The governor shall “take care that the laws are faithfully executed and shall be the conservator of the peace” in the state. This power to enforce laws is almost identical to that of the president of the United States. He or she has the power to veto legislation, although the Georgia General Assembly can override the governor’s veto with a two-thirds majority in each chamber.

From the Governor’s office official website. See also the Georgia constitution.

Fast Fact from the Georgia constitution: “The Governor shall take care that the laws are faithfully executed…” OCGA 42-4-14 #BrianKemp

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SECTION II.
DUTIES AND POWERS OF GOVERNOR

Photo: Twitter

Page 30.

Paragraph I. Executive powers. The chief executive powers shall be vested in the Governor. The other executive officers shall have such powers as may be prescribed by this Constitution and by law.

Paragraph II. Law enforcement. The Governor shall take care that the laws are faithfully executed and shall be the conservator of the peace throughout the state.

We note this includes OCGA 42-4-14

AFP/LIBRE Initiative-Georgia is holding an amnesty sales seminar and pushing an easier life in GA for illegal aliens – David Casas, Director of Grassroots Operations

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Image: Libre Initiative- Georgia Facebook page.

The pro-amnesty LIBRE Initiative – a project of Americans for Prosperity (AFP)

David Casas. Photo: Gwinnett Daily Post.

Former Republican state Rep David Casas is Director of Grassroots Operations LIBRE Initiative – Georgia. See Casas bio on Ballotpedia. 

* UPDATE: Sign up here to attend the LIBRE Initiative Georgia “yes to amnesty” event. Don’t miss the terms and conditions for attendance. 

**UPDATE AGAIN: It seems that a group in Washington D.C. (since 1995) calling itself “America’s Future” is proud to be cohost (?) of the LIBRE-Georgia event.

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David Casas Lobbies for the LIBRE Initiative Corporation. Below is a short version of what Casas pushed during the last state legislative session.

HB 120 – 2021/2022 attempt to change GA law so that illegal aliens could access much lower instate tuition rates in taxpayer-funded colleges than Americans and legal immigrants from other states. HB 120 was a hustle in that the first two versions (of three) did not actually contain the “DACA” language the sponsor, Rep Kasey Carpenter (R), told the House was in it. BTW: DACA recipients are illegal aliens. See written testimony from a retired senior INS/Border Patrol agent. The management at Libre GA knew all of this. So did the legislators who voted the bill out of committee. HB 120 was stopped before it could see a floor vote.

See the House video of David Casas lobbying for HB 120.

David Casas. Photo: LIBRE Initiative-Georgia Facebook page.
  • Related (with video): David Casas, Director of Grassroots Operations for The LIBRE Initiative Georgia on Univision: “Immigration reform (amnesty) will come from an effort of the people.”

 HB 60 (see also HB 999) – 2021/2022 Legislation labeled “school choice!” from Rep Wes Cantrell (R) that would have provided a small fraction of Georgia K-12 students with a taxpayer-funded “Promise Scholarship” to attend private schools. The bills would have created accounts for parents to pay schools with state funds and put parents on an oversight committee to decide eligible expenses. The original language did not exclude or mention the 400K-ish illegal aliens in Georgia. The amended versions contained language that was sold as excluding illegal aliens. It didn’t. See here for more info. The bills would have created a scenario in which private school tuition was funded for some illegal aliens while some American students were left out.

Video of LIBRE Georgia’s David Casas lobbying for HB 60 here.

SB 601 – 2022 – From the same people who designed HB 60/HB 999. Senator Butch Miller (R). sponsor. The bill did not contain a real tool to exclude illegal alien students or parents/families. The bill made it all the way from the hopper to the Senate floor in twelve days. The Senate Higher Education Committee Chairman, Sen Chuck Payne (R), did not allow any public comment. The bill would have created a scenario in which private school tuition was funded for some illegal aliens while some American students were left out. See the statement of support from Libre GA spokesman David Casas here.

After we made it clear that we had spread the word on the contents regarding illegal immigration, the bill was voted down on the floor 29-20.

  • Related: (with video) LIBRE Initiative Georgia’s David Casas on Univision for the 10-year anniversary of Obama’s illegal DACA scam.

 * More video: David Casas on Univision peddles a repeat of the failed 1986 amnesty for illegal aliens while Biden administration operates an open border to the world. Follow the money. Like the Chamber of Commerce, Casas is pushing additional foreign labor in the U.S.

  • A March, 2022 post with more on David Casas, the LIBRE Initiative – Georgia, HB 932, the liberal AJC and the push for amnesty… here.