In politically charged, unforgiving times there is thankfully here and there a cause that can unite Republicans and Democrats, conservatives and liberals alike. I believe such a cause is the defeat of HB226, blandly entitled “Criminal Amendments,” sponsored by Rep. Candice Pierucci (R-Riverton).
This bill was killed by a committee of the Utah Senate last Tuesday, but it is threatening to rear its ugly head again in the waning days of this legislative session.
Passage of HB226 would result in immediate, automatic deportation of legal immigrants who commit relatively minor offenses, called Class A misdemeanors, without a hearing in U.S. Immigration Court or any other due process. Conduct resulting in a Class A misdemeanor charge usually does not involve violence and rarely (at least for first-time offenders) requires jail time, resulting instead in probation, a suspended sentence and often not even a fine.
It should be noted that illegal immigrants have no residence rights and are automatically deported whenever they are found. If they commit any kind of offense, they are deported.
Over 200,000 legal immigrants reside in Utah. They came here seeking a better life, fleeing persecution, violence or economic collapse in their own countries.
They followed the rules to obtain a green card qualifying them to legally reside and work here. They established homes, secured jobs and sunk roots here. They are our neighbors and co-workers. They traded instability for stability, unsettled lives for settled ones. The vast majority are law-abiding people who have never committed a serious crime.
If HB226 is adopted, Utah would no longer be a settled place for legal immigrants. Here’s why: Today, under federal law, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) cannot summarily arrest and automatically deport legal immigrants who commit Class A misdemeanors, because in Utah the maximum penalty for such misdemeanors is 364 days in jail. But adding one day to the maximum penalty, as HB226 does (making it 365 days, rather than 364 days), would authorize ICE to swoop in, arrest and automatically deport legal immigrants who commit these relatively minor offenses. One added day can make all the difference in the life of a legal immigrant and his/her family.
Make no mistake. HB226’s sole target is legal immigrants. They are the only people truly adversely affected by this bill. To a citizen, the bill might at most mean the remote possibility of one more day in jail. To a legal immigrant, the bill would mean automatic, permanent deportation. This would understandably unsettle the lives of the whole population of legal immigrants.
Is this who we are as Utahns?
It’s hard for most of us to relate to the kind of fear this one added day could cause. Assume I’m a legal immigrant. I have a wife and a child. I have no prior criminal record. I’ve lived in Utah for 10 years, working the entire time in a responsible position for the same employer. What if my vindictive ex-wife has secured a protective order barring me from being within 500 feet of her? She and I find ourselves in the same grocery store. She sees me, phones the police and I am charged with stalking, a Class A misdemeanor. If the maximum penalty for stalking remains 364 days, as it is now, I cannot be automatically deported. If HB226 passes and the maximum penalty is increased to 365 days, I’ll be on a plane back to my home country. I will have no hearing before a U.S. immigration judge with discretion to review the actual circumstances of my case. I am turned over to ICE for automatic deportation without any due process rights. The Utah Legislature becomes my prosecutor, judge, jury and “executioner.”
Under HB226, misdemeanor stalking would have more drastic consequences for me and my family than a serious felony crime would have for anyone else.
For legal immigrants, who are often our law-abiding neighbors and coworkers, the consequences of adding one additional day to the maximum sentence for a Class A misdemeanor would make the difference between living a peaceful, settled life, or living in the same kind of fear they came here to escape.
Defeat of HB226 tells the world, “For Utahns, living in politically charged, unforgiving times does not mean we forsake our humanity.”