Carcieri seeks help of religious leaders in immigration furor
PROVIDENCE - Governor Don Carcieri called on religious leaders yesterday to appeal for calm following protests and controversy over an executive order he signed last week cracking down on illegal immigration.
The latest reaction to his order was a rowdy protest Thursday, when dozens of protesters filled his policy office chanting slogans such as "No human is illegal." Capitol Police removed them from the State House with no arrests.
The Republican governor told WPRO-AM yesterday that a woman on his staff was bruised when a door was flung open on her during the protest. He said staff members are afraid that people are bursting into their offices.
"The thing that happened at the State House yesterday cannot continue, should not continue. It is not helping anything," he said. "We need to get this thing calmed down, and we need the religious leaders and others to make that appeal."
Carcieri's order requires state departments and companies that do business with the state to use a government database to verify the immigration status of new workers. It also orders State Police and prison officials to identify immigration violators in state custody and report them to federal authorities for possible deportation.
Several religious leaders asked him this week to rescind or reconsider his order. They say it creates a climate of fear among minority communities and could hurt legal immigrants who become victims of racial profiling.
Some also have questioned whether illegal immigration is as much of a problem as Carcieri contends and criticized him for failing to present hard numbers on how much his order would cost or save the state. The state is struggling to close an estimated $550 million budget deficit.
The Rev. Eliseo Nogueras, president of the Hispanic Ministerial Association in Rhode Island, said yesterday that he also wants calm, but that the governor should tone down his rhetoric and stick to the facts, rather than "inflating the situation."
"Most of our people are hard-working, contribute to our economy, hard-working citizens and hard-working families," he said. "They don't need to be targeted in this manner."
Carcieri's order does not apply to local police departments, although he urged them to take similar steps. On Thursday, Providence Police Chief Dean Esserman said his department would not comply because it could have a chilling effect and erode the community's trust in its local police. He said members of the community could become less likely to report crime.
"It seems to me entirely irresponsible for the law enforcement community to be saying that if they're there illegally, we're not going to bother, we're not going to bother if a crime has been committed," Carcieri told the station.
