California lawmakers borrowed the same kind of rhetoric we’ve been hearing from Mayors Bill de Blasio and Rahm Emanuel, pledging to push back against President-elect Donald’s Trump’s immigration policies. De Blasio and Emanuel both pledged to protect illegal immigrants living in their sanctuary cities from Trump’s deportation plans. The California legislature indicated they have the same goal in their opening session this week.
While Democratic Assemblyman Marc Levine of San Rafael called Trump’s immigration policies “ethnic cleansing,” Republican Travis Allen of Huntington Beach called the resolution “reckless demagoguery,” and said Trump only plans to deport those who are also criminals.
“When we are attacked, we have to fight back,” said Sen. Ricardo Lara (D-Bell Gardens), whose parents were immigrants in the country illegally before they gained citizenship. He said opponents of rolling back current policies “are going to fight [proponents of mass deportations] in the streets.”
In addition to putting a stop to Trump's deportations, the California lawmakers have also proposed legislation to provide attorneys to illegal immigrants, deny assistance to a potential registry of Muslim immigrants and insist that California voters must first have a say on any kind of wall along the Mexican border.
In other words, the nation's electors are not going to make President Trump's life easy.