Bob Filner: “I rise today to say that we must stop the splintering of American families that resulted from the so-called immigration…”

“I rise today to say that we must stop the splintering of American families that resulted from the so-called immigration reform act passed in 1996. We must stop deporting hardworking legal, I repeat, legal immigrants who are raising stable families only because they committed a minor infraction years or even decades ago. We must stop hauling away parents in the middle of the night in front of their children, and we must stop denying these people now in detention the most basic constitutional rights that we in America believe everyone should have. Yet that is exactly what the 1996 immigration law does. It redefines the term ``aggravated felony,'' which sounds so horrible to cover virtually every crime ever committed. It is retroactive, covering crimes decades ago. It denies basic constitutional protections such as bail and visitation rights. Again, I repeat, we are talking about legal immigrants, immigrants residing in this country in a legal fashion. The law that was passed in 1996 removes the authority of immigration judges to take into account a person's contributions to our society as well as any past misdeeds.”