I Cannot Believe John Barrow Said This

John Barrow has been nipping on a little too much of the Blue Dog Kool-Aid. The latest issue of La Voz Latina is carrying a story about him with this headline: U.S. Congressman Wants to Ban Immigrant Children From Public Schools. In the article, John Newton reports that recently, when Barrow was speaking in Savannah, the congressman made it clear that he is opposed to any form of federal aid for undocumented workers-including emergency medical care and public school education for their children. In response to a question about whether he would support legislation to that end, Barrow reportedly said:

"Yes, sir," he replied. We already have legislation that denies Medicare and Medicaid benefits to people who have no right to be here. I believe it already is the policy of this federal government to require that a condition for getting
federal aid and education is that you have to be legally entitled to be here in the first place. That's the policy that I support."

And

"It is fair to point out that people who are here illegally have left an economy
where they had no medical benefits to begin with."

Even Mike Huckabee knows better than this. Even Huckabee successfully argued that you don't punish children for the sins of their parents.

Forget what's "right" here. From a purely practical perspective, doesn't Barrow understand that failure to provide basic medical care for children-regardless of how they came to be here-creates a public health problem for all of us? When children are not immunized or have communicable diseases that go untreated, we are all at greater risk.

And, does he not understand that failure to educate children-regardless of how they came to be here-creates a public safety problem for all of us? It is not as if we can pretend that these children are not here, so if they're not in school, what does Barrow think they'll be doing with their time? If they grow up unhealthy and illiterate, what impact does he think that will have on the quality of life in our communities?

Given that children who do not complete high school are incarcerated at a higher rate than others, unless Barrow also proposes that we withhold from the children of undocumented workers the privilege of appearing in juvenile court and becoming residents of the nearest jail, all he's doing is asking taxpayers to spend the most money possible in the least effective manner. That makes zero sense. Children should never become the front line in the battle to stop illegal immigration.

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