L.A. County Pledges $3M To Fight Deportations, While Local Schools See $333M Shortfall

Brittany M. Hughes | December 21, 2016
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Los Angeles County just pledged $3 million in taxpayer money to help illegal aliens fight deportation, in yet another example of a liberal-run bastion of "progressivism" that puts politics ahead of its own citizens.

KPCC, a radio station out of Southern California, reported that the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted almost unanimously Tuesday to put millions in public funding toward the legal defense initiative over the next two years. Only one lone Republican supervisor dissented.

The fund, which has a total goal of $10 million, was launched Monday by L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti in response to President-elect Donald Trump’s campaign promise to deport millions of illegal aliens living in the United States. According to Garcetti, half the money used to defend illegal aliens against being removed from the country will come from city and local governments (i.e., the taxpayers), while the other half will be supported by private donors.

Perhaps even more shocking than local officials’ plan to use taxpayer cash to fund legal help for thousands of people living in open violation of the law, L.A. County’s $3 million pledge comes at a time when the L.A. school system is facing a projected $333 million budget deficit heading into the 2017-18 academic year, with experts saying that shortfall could double by 2020.

Additionally, L.A. County’s recorded debt sits at a whopping $20 billion.

But the area’s financial woes clearly aren’t keeping local officials from dumping millions into helping the masses of undocumented aliens living in the surrounding area. According to KPCC, roughly 815,000 illegal aliens currently reside in L.A. County. At an estimated cost of $5,000 per case, the total amount needed to defend every illegal alien living in Los Angeles County alone could surpass $4 billion.  Officials estimate the that $10 million in funding would only stretch far enough to cover about 2,000 immigration cases, while the Center for Immigration Studies’ Jessica Vaughan said the cash will likely be wasted on futile legal proceedings.

“The reality is that most of the individuals that will be receiving this taxpayer-funded counsel are not going to qualify to stay in the country, they don't have a route to legal presence here,” Vaughan told KPCC. “And the immigration organizations that provide this counsel already are providing assistance to people that have the best shot of being able to stay.”

Vaughan added that many of these aliens will fall under ICE’s deportation priorities due to having a criminal history in the United States – an ugly pill that Los Angeles and plenty of other U.S. cities don’t seem to have a problem swallowing. For its part, L.A. has long been known as a “sanctuary city” for unlawfully present immigrants, openly refusing to cooperate with federal immigration officials seeking to take over custody of criminal aliens who’ve been detained by local law enforcement.

Despite their own refusal to abide by federal immigration law, Los Angeles has its share of criminal aliens wandering its streets. Just last July, ICE busted 100 criminal aliens living in L.A. for deportation proceedings, including illegal immigrants with histories including murder, assault, DUIs, burglary and rape. Some of those arrested by ICE had been released following local law enforcement’s refusal to recognize immigration detainers. 

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