The $1.1 trillion omnibus spending bill recently passed by
Congress and signed into law was not only not contested by Republicans who
control Congress, but was gaily advanced by them. Every time Democrats threaten
to shut the government down if Republicans don’t agree to increase spending,
Republicans agree to increase spending. Even when they are the majority party
in both houses. Those stout proponents of smaller government! What courage,
principle and character! They are just who they claimed to be, right?
This
time, Republicans actually proposed and pushed through a temporary
expansion of the H-2B visa program, quadrupling the issuance of visas to
foreign workers for non-agricultural or temporary service jobs in 2016. They
also fully funded the
refugee-resettlement program in spite of major national-security concerns.
Not content with those “accomplishments,” they permitted federal grants to
“sanctuary cities” with no qualifying
conditions (I thought sanctuary
cities were so named because they refused to use money or resources to enforce federal immigration laws?!) and dismissed all
efforts to reform the cronyism-riddled EB-5 visa program that essentially
allows foreigners to obtain a green card if they simply give a certain amount
of cash to an American business.
(Last week, on his radio program,
Rush Limbaugh had this to say about establishment Republicans: “The donors have become more important than the
voters to many in the Republican Party. So, if you, masses of people who
vote, want something, the power of your vote collectively expressed has now
been dwarfed by the amount of money given by donors. And if the donors
want the Republican Party to stand aside or maybe even join with the Democrats
on comprehensive immigration reform, then that's what elected Republicans are
gonna do.”).
He’s right.
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