Jim DeMint and the Heritage Foundation try to kill immigration reform
Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
Tea Party darlin', former Senator Jim DeMint (R-SC), now pulling down big bucks for his conservative demagoguery at the Heritage Foundation, has an op-ed in the Washington Post (where else) this afternoon, What amnesty for illegal immigrants will cost America (note the code language to the nativist base) claiming that:
An exhaustive study by the Heritage Foundation
has found that after amnesty, current unlawful immigrants would receive
$9.4 trillion in government benefits and services and pay more than $3
trillion in taxes over their lifetimes. That leaves a net fiscal deficit
(benefits minus taxes) of $6.3 trillion. That deficit would have to be financed by increasing the government debt or raising taxes on U.S. citizens.
* * *
Given the U.S. debt of $17 trillion, the fiscal effects detailed in our
study should be at the forefront of legislators’ minds as they consider
immigration reform.
Ummm, sorry, but no. By now any rational intelligent human being should know that one does not give any credence to anything produced by the Heritage Foundation. Ever. Especially now that a demagogue like Jim DeMint is at its helm.
Greg Sargent writes in The right’s last stand against immigration reform?:
The Heritage Foundation has just released its long awaited report
supposedly documenting that the path to citizenship in the Gang of
Eight immigration reform compromise will sock the taxpayer with a
multi-trillion-dollar bill. You cannot overstate how much opponents of
reform have staked on the hope that this report will be the magic bullet
to kill the proposal. This is the report that’s supposed to send House
conservatives running away, never to return.