by Mario T. García
In the last few weeks conservative Republicans and Tea Party activists have proposed changing the 14th amendment to the U.S. Constitution. That amendment declares that all persons born in the United States are citizens of this country.
What these conservatives really want to do is change the amendment to prevent U.S.-born children of undocumented immigrants from gaining U.S. citizenship. This is how low the anti-immigrant nativists have stooped. They claim that one of the main reasons why undocumented immigrants enter the U.S. is to have babies -- the so-called "anchor babies" -- that will allow parents to gain legal status through their children.
There is no evidence that this is why these immigrants cross the border.
First and foremost, these immigrants come to get jobs to sustain their families. Moreover, it is not until the U.S.-born child becomes twenty-one years old that he/she can petition the government for legal status for his/her parents.
Few -- if any -- undocumented immigrants possess such a long-range strategy. But this evidence is of little relevance to those who would deny citizenship to U.S.-born children.
This is nothing but callousness and a lack of humanity to children who -- through no fault of their own -- are born to undocumented parents. How much further can anti-immigrant proponents go in their un-American and un-Christian behavior?
