Representative Brat Complements Trump’s Views on Immigration
Congressman Dave Brat needs a History-101 lesson.
In July this year as his campaign was ratcheting up, Congressman Brat sponsored a bill (H.R. 5826) known as the “Detain and Deport Act.” This modern day version of the Fugitive Slave Act aligns Brat directly with Donald Trump in the treatment of undocumented aliens. Brat’s bill requires all local and state officials to cooperate with ICE. If they don’t cooperate they will be deprived of any federal funds that would otherwise be allocated under section 241(i) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 1231(i)) or the Cops on the Beat program under part Q of title I of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 (42 U.S.C. 3796dd et seq.); or any other law enforcement or Department grant.
Many free African Americans were captured and sold into slavery as a result of the Fugitive Slave Acts of 1793 and 1850
So, here is a little history lesson on the Fugitive Slave Acts, just for Dave Brat. Passed in 1793 and 1850, the Fugitive Slave Acts (the focus of the movie Twelve Years a Slave) required that all escaped slaves be returned to their slave-owning masters upon capture. The Act of 1850 further expanded the penalties for resistance. Local and state officials, as well as citizens of both free and slave states that failed cooperate with this law were penalized with varying degrees of punishment, including six months’ imprisonment and a fine. Officials could be arrested and charged with aiding a runaway slave on as little evidence as the slave master’s sworn testimony of ownership. The suspected slave could not ask for a jury trial or testify on his or her own behalf.
One of the consequences of the Fugitive Slave Acts was the capture and sale into slavery of free African Americans. With Brat and Trump’s misguided and uniform ignorance on the topic of immigrants, one has to wonder whether Brat’s Detain and Deport Act will ultimately end up imprisoning and/or deporting legal immigrants and U.S. citizens.
The detain and deport act is A close rewrite of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850.
This type of government overreach is normally the sort of thing that Republicans complain about, and hypocrisy is nothing new to Brat or Trump. However, it is possible that Brat may be thinking ahead. This type of legislation will be needed to legalize Trump’s detention squads as his administration has promised to round up 11 million undocumented aliens from their homes and businesses.
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