By Brandon Moseley
Alabama Political Reporter
On Tuesday, July 1, Congressman Mike Rogers (R) from Saks blasted a plan by President Obama’s Department of Health and Human Services to relocate large numbers of illegal aliens to Anniston, Alabama where they would be housed at the Center for Domestic Preparedness (CDP) on what was once Fort McClellan.
Representative Rogers called the plan, “misguided and misinformed” in a letter that he sent to Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Burwell and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson. Rep. Rogers said that many of the illegal immigrants were likely apprehended during the growing crisis at the nation’s Southwest border.
In his letter Rep. Rogers strongly criticized the proposal and said he opposed the concept outright. Rogers first learned of the plan from an email sent to his office by the Federal agency. Rep. Rogers wrote, “The CDP is a world class first responder training facility; however, it was in no way built to house immigration detainees, much less children. CDP is over 900 miles from the Rio Grande Valley where many of these border crossings occur, and transporting illegal immigrants so far away from the border and their home countries would seem to make this crisis worse. It seems implausible that there is not a temporary facility within 900 miles of our southwestern border capable of housing these individuals without the disruption that I am concerned this transfer would cause to CDP operations. In addition, I am concerned the housing of many of these unaccompanied minor children who arrived here under the false belief they would be granted legal status – a belief challenged little if at all over the years by the Obama Administration – could put deep and challenging stresses on the local community’s health system.”
Just last week, Rep. Mike Rogers demanded answers from Homeland Security Secretary Johnson on what could be done to remedy the recent surge of unaccompanied children from Central America illegally entering our country on the Southwest border.
Rep. Rogers said, “Right now, we have a crisis and I don’t see the Administration doing anything about it – other than trying to house the children…You can’t send your children up here and let them stay,” Rogers said during the hearing.
Rep. Rogers has been a sharp critic of the Obama Administration’s border policies and last week sent a letter to President Obama blaming his Administration for their “deliberate failure to enforce our immigration laws.”
On Tuesday, June 24 Sen. Jeff Sessions (R) from Alabama said on the floor of the Senate, “We have a situation now where illegal immigrants seek out and turn themselves in to border patrol so they can be brought into the United States, be united with family members, apply for jobs, attend schools, and stay in the United States—whether through skipping court hearings, receiving asylum, or simply ignoring orders to leave. We can all expect, five or ten years from now, politicians in this very body to say that these illegal immigrants ‘came here through no fault of their own’ and are entitled to citizenship. Is this a policy of a great nation? It’s a policy of a nation that advocates for open borders, but it’s not a policy that’s compatible with a system of law, duty, and order.”
Sen. Sessions continued, “And the chaos continues. Indeed, the President actively continues to incentivize even more illegal immigration—he reauthorized his Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program for two years and held a White House ceremony honoring ten DACA recipients; he recently unilaterally authorized an additional 100,000 guest workers; and, as National Review pointed out, the Justice Department is now hiring lawyers to represent unaccompanied alien children in immigration court, to maximize the number who will receive permission to stay. Claims that DACA does not apply to these new arrivals is simply a distraction. DACA is a unilateral action that established the precedent that those who come to the United States at a certain age will receive special exemptions from the law. ICE officers report that they are often forced to release even high-risk individuals, of unknown ages and dates of entry, who simply assert ‘DREAM Act’ privileges.” The President has vowed to use executive orders to implement the immigration reforms that he is demanding if Congress does not pass some version of immigration reform this year.
Details of the plan to relocate large numbers of illegal aliens to Calhoun County are not known at this time, but some sources are presuming that the minor illegal aliens (most of them teen males) will be enrolled in local public schools in the Anniston area for the school year beginning in August.
Congressman Mike Rogers was first elected to Congress in 2002 and is seeking a seventh term.
