Don’t Let Fear & Anti-Immigrant Sentiment Win: Stand Up Against Vitter’s Census Amendment

The U.S. Senate is considering an amendment to the Commerce, Justice and Science Appropriations bill that if passed, will effectively marginalize all immigrant communities – Anglo, Asian and Brown – living in the United States. The amendment introduced by Sen. David Vitter of Louisiana (R) proposes to include questions in the 2010 Census on immigration status. If passed, the amendment will inject fear into an action required by the U.S. Constitution every ten years. The census provides a population count needed to determine the allocation of federal funds (for everything from schools and hospitals, to highways and public transportation) as well as political representation. Vitter’s amendment hurts already financially strapped local governments by leaving millions uncounted. Because Voto Latino’s mission is to encourage civic participation, the Vitter Amendment directly contradicts our core values. Please contact your representative TODAY to vote against the Vitter Amendment: click here Forward this to your networks- our power is in our numbers!

If passed, Vitter’s amendment would kill the possibility of an accurate count by next year’s census. Because the amendment discourages immigrant Americans from completing the census questionnaire due to fear of persecution, it would make it impossible to appropriately allocate more than $400 billion in federal funds to communities that need it.   The amendment would deprive populous states like Nevada, California, Arizona, Colorado, Illinois, South Carolina, Florida, Texas and Arkansas from receiving funds needed to sustain critical services like fire and emergency units, Medicaid, childcare, early childhood education and school lunch programs. Police funding, for example, would be cut, leaving our officers without the tools they need to combat crime.   For the sake of pleasing extreme anti-immigrant groups, Vitter is willing to ignore the long-term effects his amendment will have on all Americans, not just immigrant communities. Aside from wasting more than $7 billion in tax payer’s money that have already been spent to prepare for next year’s population count, the amendment would also deprive all communities from accurate congressional representation in the U.S. House of Representatives. Along with their federal funds being cut, states mentioned above and others with similar growing demographics would also loose political power in the nation’s most important political election – determining who wins the presidency.   Sen. Vitter can not be allowed to inject hate and fear into an institution that has served the nation since its founding 233 years ago. Legislators must be made aware of the long-term effects that Vitter’s amendment will have on all communities. Contact your senator immediately and demand that they vote “No” on Vitter’s amendment. Please click on the link below to find the phone number for your senators’ Washington and local offices.   click here Please forward this to your networks. Our power is in our numbers!

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 20th, 2009 at 10:44 am and is filed under US Census. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.