Republican lawmakers have been pushing a bill through Congress that would impose tougher penalties for illegal aliens who return to the United States after being deported, and a new poll of American voters showed that the public strongly supports the measure.
The bill, known as Kate’s Law, was passed by the House of Representatives on June 29, but Senate Democrats have threatened to stand in the way of its final approval, arguing that Americans don’t approve of it.
However, the results of a new Rasmussen poll stood in direct contradiction to that claim, finding that 63 percent of Americans actually do favor increased criminal penalties for repeat border-crossers.
A mere 26 percent of those polled said they opposed such a law, while 12 percent were undecided.
The bill currently making its way through Congress was named in honor of Kate Steinle, a 32-year-old who was killed in July 2015 by an illegal immigrant who had seven felony convictions and who had already been deported from the U.S. five times.
The incident happened in San Francisco — a “sanctuary city” that doesn’t think it’s necessary to notify U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement before releasing detained undocumented immigrants.
If enacted, it would afford criminal justice officials the ability to press a wide variety of charges, as well as impose longer sentences in an effort to keep repeat illegal immigrants off the streets, according to The Daily Caller.
Since making it through the House with 233 GOP votes and 24 Democrat votes, it heads to the Senate where a battle likely awaits. In July 2016, a similar version of the law failed to get the minimum 60 votes needed to end debate on the issue.
If they block the current bill, Senate Democrats will be circumventing the will of their constituents and putting even more Americans at risk of being killed by criminals who have no business being in the U.S. in the first place.
(via: Conservative Tribune)
