Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D) said he would veto a bill barring undocumented immigrant students from receiving in-state tuition at state universities, which passed a Senate committee Thursday.
A spokesman for the governor called the legislation, put forward in the House and Senate by two Loudoun County Republicans, “counterproductive and mean-spirited.” The Senate version advanced Thursday morning out of the Senate Education and Health Committee on a party-line vote of 8 to 7.
McAuliffe “is focused on expanding economic opportunity to Virginians from all walks of life, not targeting some for discrimination,” spokesman Brian Coy added.
In his first State of the Commonwealth address Wednesday night, McAuliffe called for passage of a state version of the so-called Dream Act that would grant in-state tuition to some students who were brought to the country illegally as children. Attorney General Mark R. Herring (D) has already ruled that students who qualify for deferred action under President Obama’s recent executive order can apply for the tuition discount.
“The Senators who voted for this measure should meet some of the young people they are trying to punish,” Herring said in a statement Thursday.
Herring is right. Black and Ramadan should have to meet some of the kids they are attempting to discriminate against. I think they would feel like worthless dogs if they ever met some of these kids that have worked so hard to become something.
Perhaps Black and Ramadan should go over to any of the high schools that have an ROTC program and look at one of the practices. Many of the local ROTC programs have a lot of immigrant kids. Those kids are extremely proud of what they do. A good place to witness this American pride is at the Manassas Christmas parade. It just makes you feel good to watch these kids. They are living the American dream…until they bump head on into one of these stupid, mean-spirited laws that puts a brick on their head. Yes, immigrant kids are dependent on in-state tuition as much as our own kids.
These kids are here and will be here, regardless of Black and Ramadan and the Virginia General Assembly. Most Virginians realize that an educated society is a productive society. Let’s take and best and brightest and allow them to be all they can be. I have spent my life trying to educate people. I feel what Black and Ramadan are trying to do is simply morally repugnant. It looks like two “pro-life” legislators really aren’t pro-life at all. They have no regard for aspirations and dreams. I don’t see how they or the Virginia Senate sleeps at night. Hypocrites!
Good for Gov. McAuliffe for his promise to veto this bill should it cross his desk.
” Attorney General Mark R. Herring (D) has already ruled that students who qualify for deferred action under President Obama’s recent executive order can apply for the tuition discount.”
Attorneys General don’t “rule”. They issue legal opinions and advise their client, “the state”. Judges “rule”. Judges “rule” on how a particular law applies to a particular situation.
While I agree that attorney generals issue an opinion, I am glad he did.
Could you please find some other animal to compare them to? Dogs aren’t worthless, and I find this statement offensive.
For example, when I think about democrats I think of rats, termites or cockroaches. I would never compare a democrat to a dog because dogs are loyal, generally well-behaved and decent, with a strong work ethic.
Do you really feel that needs to be said? I am sorry you have such a partisan view of the world and can only express it through name calling but not here.
About dogs. I love dogs but not all dogs. Some are worthless.
Maybe Herring should come home once in awhile and investigate why the immigrant-heavy public schools in Eastern Loudoun seem to be having so much trouble meeting established academic standards. Some of those “dreams” may just be pipe dreams.
What’s your point, Wolve, re the issue of whether children brought here without any volition on their part, but who have known only this country and this state, should be able to attend public universities here on the same basis as their classmates? If a child brought here without volition is struggling academically, how does that affect the policy choice of whether that child should be able to pay in-state tuition? If his/her academic performance is low, that kid’s not going to UVA, W&M or Tech in any event.
The point is, my dear Scout, that those schools are now majority and even larger new-immigrant in population. Having once been great suburban schools from elementary to high school, they are now close to failing the set standards and are way below most other schools in the county. If you are going to talk “Dream” kids, you would do well to find out why many of those potential “Dream” kids on a large scale are not performing up to the standards necessary to fulfill such dreams at higher levels. This is not just a couple of kids. It’s a school district in need of extraordinary help. If you want productive “dreams,” you had better start taking care of the critical base which is necessary for the fruition of those “dreams.” When you start shoving the educational Gordian Knot from the elementary schools to the middle schools and then to the high schools, you are going to wind up with “remedial” written all over Dreamland, if you get my meaning.
And these schools are in what was not long ago Herring’s own State Senate District.
@Wolve
Many immigrant kids do struggle academically. Some of this struggle is because their parents are working 2-3 jobs and even if they weren’t, they couldn’t help them with their school work.
However, some of these kids flourish and do well academically against all odds. These are the kids you want to hold back and punish. What incentives do they have to excel?
They might as well sit around, not do their homework, and oh as an aside, join a gang and sell drugs on the side since you and Ramadan and Dick Black want to basically strip away any chance these kids have of going on to college.
Sorry, but shame on all of you. It really is just mean-spirited.
@Wolve
The Dream kids are doing real well. That’s why they are headed to college if some cheap bastards don’t pull the rug out from under them.
East Loudoun like my community has changed. Check out Vienna. It has changed also. That’s pretty much what happens with older communities
Seriously, do you want Herring to come back and tutor them all? Do you think that Loudoun has any more problem than Prince William and Fairfax? It doesn’t.
You are talking about apples and oranges. I am talking about kids who are meeting with academic success. You are talking about kids that are struggling. You want to throw them all out.
There are very few issues I feel as passionately about as this one, so game on!
Herring didn’t do a damned thing about it even while he was representing this Senate district. The first post was purely tongue-in-cheek.
Now, how about you drawing up the parameters of the “Dream Act” you espouse. Just a select few who are doing well enough to possibly succeed at the higher level or a whole passle of immigrant kids under some sort of affirmative action deal regardless of true academic progress? Of late, this society has told us too often that it will only hurt a little bit and then they wind up cutting your arm off — as in: “You won’t lose your doctor or your insurance policy.” No more of that.
Are you willing to give full support to closing down the southern border effectively? (And don’t tell me it can’t be done. If we can put a”rover” on Mars, we can close down a fricking border.) Unless that border is closed, the schools in our district will remain a magnet for the next waves of illegal immigrants, giving us no respite to try to rectify the problems with the current crop of underperforming students. Keep the neophyte waves coming one after another, and we won’t have much of a chance to do that effectively. What say you?
It wasn’t Herrings job to do anything about it…whatever that mysterious “it” is.
I have always been willing to shut down the border except for authorized people. No border can be totally non-porous. Yes, I will say that. People break out of prison. People escape communist countries. Where there is a will, there is a way. There are also the coast lines. Pretty difficult to seal those off too.
But that has nothing to do with this discussion. Obviously if these kids are doing well in school, they have been here for a while, have learned the language, have studied, applied themselves, and also behaved themselves. It isn’t just a handful. Lots of immigrant kids fit this bill. They are Virginia residents which is what the laws say about in-state tuition. Their families have paid taxes. So what’s the rub, other than meanness. No, they aren’t taking someone else’s spot. Last I checked, there was not a finite number of in-state tuitions.
Lastly, don’t we want to encourage all young people to be all they can be? When kids are smart, productive and ambitious, they get good jobs raise good families and selfishly, they pay into the social security system. This is not a bad thing. Just look at it selfishly if that is the only way you can face an immigrant kid doing anything but collecting garbage or sweeping up schools.
Well, I find it rather insulting that, after years of ruminating here on the possibilities of the “Dream Act,” I get called “mean-spirited” when I push for helping a much larger group of immigrants get up to snuff educationally at the basic level. Talk about failure to act leaving us with potential trouble on the streets.
Several years ago, my Hispanic immigrant son-in-law warned me that, if I stayed in this house, which now belongs to me lock, stock, and barrel, after 30 years, I would wind up living in a “barrio.” I scoffed at the time. He was right. We are far more than halfway there in our neighborhood. And the school system, once at the top, is now at the very bottom of the county roster — way at the bottom. My concern right now is more for that than anything else.
I will live in one too if I live that long. However, that has nothing to do with the Dream Act.
It is mean-spirited, Wolve, if you want to stop at getting up to snuff educationally in public school. what about those kids who are already up to snuff because they have been here a while and have worked hard. Most of success comes from within anyway. Why even try if you can’t go any further educationally?
Bologna about Herring. It was his district He could have shown some initiative and leadership at the local level. In all the time he was in that Senate seat, we never heard word one from that guy about anything.
He was a state senator. He has no control over local politics or local education. The go-to educational senator is Senator Colgan. As I recall, Herring always supported Colgan’s iniatives.
You are just trying to bad mouth him. how about telling me what you expected him to do about your immigrant kids’ school situation.
Just say you don’t like him and move on. I am not going to take up my own time having a conversation over something that he wasn’t in charge of. Your school board was in charge. Did you contact them? Bet not.
Lack of direct “control” should not stop you from lending your support, influence, and assistance from high position to your constituency. Frank Wolf did that from the greater heights of Capital Hill. Herring was largely a no-show.
@Wolve
Can’t have any dependents grateful for Democrat handouts if Herring had worked to improve things.