New York City Democrats are pressing to pass legislation which would allow 800,000 non-citizens to vote in upcoming municipal elections. It is a proposal denounced by a number of Republicans as an obvious attempt to cash in on the assumed tendency of most new immigrants to vote Democrat. While my first impulse was to agree, further investigation revealed that Green Card holders are in fact permanent residents of the States who gained that status in light of their potential contributions to it. It does not, therefore, seem unreasonable to me that they should be allowed to vote. But the N.Y. Post points out that those in the country on temporary visas need only show proof of 30 days residency to gain that privilege. This, as the Post suggests, is an outrage, a flagrant insult to the city’s 5.6 million legally registered, tax-paying citizens. Mayor elect Eric Adams, who supports the legislation, argues it is every individual’s Democratic right to have a say in his governance, but what he fails to acknowledge is that most of those involved, be they mandated by Green Cards or temporary work permits, are still allowed to vote in their countries of origin.
Outgoing Mayor Bill De Blasio, like Eric Adams also a Democrat, nevertheless thinks the proposed legislation is completely illegal. But as 34 of the 51 members of New York’s City Council have expressed their approval, it will most definitely be passed into law on Dec. 9.
New York is a so-called Sanctuary City. While “conservatives” revile the very concept as an absurd validation of illegal activity, an attempt to defend not only those who have entered the States illegally but those guilty of criminal activity after their arrival, “progressive” apologists claim this simply is not true. But my research shows that even CNN’s definition of such enclaves exposes the fundamental disrespect for the Rule of Law which is their very basis. Sanctuary Cities and States, we are told, refuse to cooperate with federal immigration authorities in their attempts to identify not only illegal immigrants but those guilty of crimes which might automatically lead to their deportation. How, to anyone of common sense, are Sanctuary Cities not an open invitation to the very sort of chaos recently unleashed upon San Fransisco, which is in fact a Sanctuary City?
While certainly not endorsing closed borders and a lack of concern for the plight of those seeking to escape the turmoil of their homelands, the political situation in New York would seem to exemplify the disdain for both the Principles and Citizens of our Western Democracies that informs those on the contemporary Left, those who have ludicrously concluded that the affluence and freedoms produced by the West’s rational, post-Enlightenment approach to existence somehow make us guilty of crimes against the rest of humanity.