Obama Labor Appointee Has Long Pro-Immigration History

Illegal immigrants have always had a friend in Thomas Perez, President Obama’s nominee for labor secretary.

As a member of the Montgomery County council in Maryland, he advocated for day-laborer sites and pushed for IDs distributed by Mexico and Guatemala to count as proof of identity, even though allowing such IDs could give illegal immigrants easier access to government-funded services.

In 2004, Perez went before the Maryland state legislature to testify against several immigration-enforcement bills, including one that would codify the state’s practice of blocking undocumented workers from acquiring driver’s licenses, and another that would require people to prove their citizenship before registering to vote, according to the Washington Post. He also opposed efforts to study how illegal immigrants are a burden on the state budget.

A day-laborer site promoted by Perez led to a wave of controversy in his community. While on the county council, he moved to open a taxpayer-funded center whose aim was to attract day laborers. The immigration status of the day laborers wasn’t a secret. CASA de Maryland, the organization that runs the center in Gaithersburg, tells National Review that it does not check on the legal status of day laborers because it is not an employer.

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