We Need More Of This...

Source: Philly.com

In Charlotte, N.C., the foreign-born population is growing fast. So is the anger against them.

In booming Charlotte, where rapid growth and plentiful jobs have attracted thousands of illegal immigrants, Romero is the latest catch in an aggressive new effort to turn routine arrests into one-way tickets out of the country.

With anti-immigration feelings running high and elections just three weeks away, this once-insular state has become a key actor in the national debate over how to absorb - or expel - illegal migrants. North Carolina has had a greater increase in foreign-born population over the last 15 years than any state in the nation: a 412 percent increase, almost five times the national average.

The same concerns and fears being voiced from Hazleton, Pa., to Riverside, N.J., to Phoenix, Ariz., are writ large in North Carolina. Illegal immigration has figured prominently in political campaigns here and in neighboring counties of South Carolina.

“This is the hottest issue I’ve ever seen,” said Mecklenburg County Sheriff Jim Pendergraph, a Democrat who is running for reelection. “And it’s going to be the hottest issue, maybe next to Iraq, in the presidential election in two years.”

Pendergraph said he had received hundreds of laudatory e-mails and letters from constituents and dozens of inquiries from other jurisdictions since he teamed with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to train 12 deputies to screen prisoners for their immigration status. Since the program started in April, his office has processed 653 immigrants for deportation.

Now the sheriff is lobbying for a federal immigration court and detention center in Charlotte to handle more cases.

“Congress has let us down. And a lot of the politicians are doing the three-monkey thing - hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil - because they’re so afraid of political correctness,” the sheriff said. “Political correctness is going to cause us to lose this country.”……

Said it before I'll say it again, this is an issue the Democrats can beat the Republicans about the head with all day long. The first party to get serious about border control and deportation is going to find itself winning a lot of elections, you did note he's a (D) right?

I think you'll find a lot of southern (D)'s perfectly poised to take this issue and run with it all the way to the White House. If you want a reason to worry about (R) electoral losses, this is an awful good one.

H/T immigration watchdog

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