50 House Democrats Join Republicans to Pass Harmful Anti-Immigrant Policy Again

Earlier today, the US House of Representatives voted on the latest of its anti-immigrant piece of legislation.

The bill, HR35, would impose additional harsh criminal legal system and immigration penalties while furthering false and politicized narratives about immigrants, as the Immigrant Legal Resource Center explained.

House Republicans named the bill the Agent Raul Gonzalez Officer Safety Act after a Border Patrol agent who died from a high-speed chase, but the bill ultimately does nothing to address the safety concerns of such high-speed chases.

The bill would create both criminal legal system and immigration consequences for any person who drives a motor vehicle while trying to escape Border Patrol or a state/local law enforcement officer working in conjunction with Border Patrol for immigration enforcement (applicable to any pursuit within 100 miles of the border). Such penalties would range from up to two years in federal prison as well as possible fines simply for driving or up to life in prison if a high-speed chase results in death.

The bill also expands the already broad grounds of inadmissibility and deportability and makes a person convicted under this law ineligible for all forms of immigration relief, including asylum.

Republicans love to fear-monger about “violent criminals,” and the crimes they are focusing on are not, in fact, violent crimes.

The ILRC unpacks well the harms of the bill:

Cruel and Unnecessary: Eliminating all avenues of relief for people seeking safety in the United States and subjecting people to harsh imprisonment sentences and deportation are cruel and unnecessary steps that do not address the safety needs of border communities.

The reality in border communities under Texas’ Operation Lone Star is that state and local law enforcement, in addition to Border Patrol, regularly engage in high speed chases in an attempt to apprehend people they suspect have entered without authorization. This law enforcement practice has had a detrimental effect on the safety of all residents of border communities. Human Rights Watch documented the detrimental effects of high speed law enforcement chases on Texas communities. Dangerous high speed chases have led to loss of life, significant injuries, destruction of private property, and fear and trauma. According to this report, in a period of 29 months, at least 74 people were killed and 189 were injured due to law enforcement pursuit of people suspected of violating immigration laws. High speed chases are a dangerous law enforcement practice that must end. Instead of seeking real solutions to make communities safer, this bill seeks to further criminalize people seeking dignity and safety.

Overbroad and Vague: The language in H.R. 35 is overbroad and vague. For example it creates penalties for “evading arrest or detention” and “intentionally fleeing” law enforcementwhich could be broadly applied especially in border communities that are already experiencing over-policing and racial profiling, as well as dangerous outcomes from high speed car chases. Black and Brown people are disproportionately more likely to be stopped, arrested, prosecuted, convicted, and sentenced to longer terms. There has been bipartisan recognition of the racial biases in the criminal legal system, and multiple bipartisan reform efforts. Increasing the severity or breadth of immigration penalties for contact with the criminal legal system will inevitably transfer these endemic discriminatory impacts into immigration law.

Double Punishment: Since contact with the criminal legal system serves as a funnel into the immigration detention and deportation system, a person can be deported — a life-long consequence that tears apart families and destabilizes communities, even if the person completed their criminal system punishment. Immigration penalties imposed in addition to the criminal system penalties create a harsh system of double punishment that disproportionately impacts Black and Brown immigrants.

Duplicative and Unjust: Adding new grounds of inadmissibility and deportability is duplicative of existing law, exacerbates racial disparities created by the entanglement of policing and immigration enforcement and increases inefficiency in the U.S. immigration system. Adding more grounds of inadmissibility and deportability and eliminating paths to status only creates confusion and harm.

Despite the fact that the bill is a harmful solution in search of a problem, it passed 264 to 155, with 50 Democrats voting for it. As Trump pledges to ramp up a mass deportation agenda, no Democrat should be voting to give Border Patrol agents greater powers with greater consequences. End stop.

Here are the 50 who voted for it:

Last year, 56 Democrats had voted for the same bill when it was brought to the floor. What accounts for the difference?

There was a loss of 15 votes:

• 4 of the 2024 YES votes lost their seats to Republicans: Matt Cartwright, Yadira Caraveo, Mary Peltola, and Susan Wild.
• 3 of the 2024 YES votes were NC Dems who didn’t run again because of the extreme NC GOP gerrymander: Jeff Jackson, Kathy Manning, and Wiley Nickel.
• 3 of the 2024 YES votes were not present: Jim Himes, Brittany Pettersen, and Mikie Sherrill.
• 2 of the 2024 YES votes did not run again and were replaced with Democrats who voted NO: Ruben Gallego being succeeded by Yassamin Ansari in AZ-03 and Colin Allred being succeeded by Julie Johnson in TX-32.
• 1 of the 2024 YES votes did not run again and was succeeded by a Republican: Elissa Slotkin.
• 2 of the 2024 YES votes flipped to NO: Brendan Boyle (PA-02) and Steven Horsford (NV-04).

And a gain of 9 votes:

• 6 of the new YES votes were Democrats who flipped a Republican seat since the last vote: Gillen, Gray, Mannion, Riley, Suozzi, and Whitesides.
• 2 of the new YES votes were Democrats who succeeded previous NO votes: McClain Delaney (replacing David Trone) and Min (replacing Katie Porter).
• 1 of the 2024 NO votes flipped to YES: Pat Ryan.

4 Democratic YES votes from 2024 were succeeded by new YES votes: Kuster -> Goodlander, Higgins → Kennedy, Kildee → McDonald Rivet, and Spanberger → Vindman.