A young Republican official in Maryland wants to put his county completely off limits to illegal immigrants, but one of his biggest opponents may be his own father, who happens to be a Democrat in the state Senate.
Blaine Young, the young GOP president of the Frederick County Board of Commissioners, is heading a movement to draft local legislation that would prohibit undocumented workers from getting jobs and renting homes, according to the
Baltimore Sun.
He says it would be like wearing “a badge of honor” for the county to be designated as “the most unfriendly county in the state of Maryland to illegal aliens.” However, his father — like other opponents — is questioning whether local governments can address immigration issues effectively, the Sun reported Monday.
“We always have and always will need immigrants,” state Sen. Ronald N. Young told the Sun. “We need to have immigration reform . . . [but] it ought to occur in Washington.”
According to the Sun, the move in Frederick County to enact strong legislation is apparently motivated by a recent local murder case against an illegal immigrant; local law enforcement efforts that have rounded up and delivered nearly 1,000 illegal immigrants to federal authorities for deportation.
Similar crackdowns, particularly in Arizona and Alabama, have led to legal battles and political fights over whether local and state authorities have the right to enact their own immigration laws.
But Blaine Young says he’s not waiting for those cases to play out or for Congress to act on reforms.
“We are going to do everything legally possible,” he told the Sun.
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