Deal Urged to Veto Immigration Bill

The Cobb Immigrant Alliance drew a strong media turnout, if few supporters, to a news conference in Glover Park at Marietta Square this morning with the goal of taking a last stand against H.B. 87, the Illegal Immigration Reform and Enforcement Act of 2011.

Gov. Nathan Deal has repeatedly said he will sign the bill, but alliance director Rich Pellegrino of the Austell area said opponents still have "prayer and faith" that Deal will change his mind while he waits for a financial analysis of the costs involved in enforcing the bill.

Pellegrino, Gerald Rose of the New Order National Human Rights Organization, Larry Pellegrini of the Georgia Latino Alliance for Human Rights and Smyrna resident Pat Burns argued that the measure is racist and the product of hate groups and will make Georgia a pariah, much as a similar law in Arizona did to that state.

If they can’t persuade Deal directly to veto the bill, Pellegrino said, alliance members hope to compel the general public to demand that the legislation die. If Deal does sign the law, something bill supporter D.A. King of the Dustin Inman Society said he expects next week, Pellegrino promised nonviolent action such as boycotts.

Deal also could face consequences when he runs for re-election in 2014, Rose said.

Pellegrino said Georgians will feel financial pain if the bill becomes law, including legal fees from defending lawsuits and lost tourism revenue from individuals and organizations refusing to come to Georgia.

The legislation would devastate Georgia’s top industry, agriculture, by driving off its labor force, said Pellegrini of the Georgia Latino Alliance for Human Rights.

But King said the legislation would be a financial boon for Georgia by removing the costs of supporting illegal immigrants. He said the H-2A agricultural visa program can provide Georgia all of the legal immigrant workers needed to ensure crops make it to harvest.

He also accused the alliance members of race-baiting by trying to turn a dispute over enforcing immigration laws and controlling U.S. borders into a racial issue.