ACLU, Open Borders Advocates, Attempt to Rewrite 9/11 Commission Report

The American Civil Liberties Union and other open border advocacy groups are attempting to rewrite the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, leaving out important sections dealing with immigration policy, charged the Federation for American Immigration Reform. In assessing the situation that led to the attacks of 9/11, the Commission pointed to glaring weaknesses in U.S. immigration policy and made concrete recommendations for reform.

The ACLU is directing its disinformation campaign against H.R. 10, House Speaker Dennis Hastert’s bill implementing the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission. That bill, unlike its Senate counterpart introduced by Senators Susan Collins (R-ME) and Joseph Lieberman (D-CT), adopts most of the Commission’s reform proposals, including those dealing with immigration policy.

“Just two months after it was published, the ACLU and other open border advocates are mounting a campaign intended to convince Congress and the American public that the 9/11 Commission report called only for reform of our intelligence agencies,” said Dan Stein, president of FAIR. “In the annals of historical revisionism, the ACLU has set a new speed record for distorting the truth. The Commission’s report clearly spells out a variety of immigration-related policy failures that contributed directly to the events of September 11, 2001, and is equally clear about the policy changes they believe are necessary to avert future attacks.”

Among a host of immigration-related changes urged by the Commission were requirements that all people entering the United States, including U.S., Canadian and Mexican citizens, carry valid passports; the establishment of national standards for the issuance of driver’s licenses, birth and death certificates and other vital forms of identification; barring the acceptance of foreign consular IDs; and improved border security. All of these matters are addressed in H.R. 10, but ignored in the Senate bill.

“The ACLU and the open borders lobby have fought these common sense policy reforms for years. And even after these policy weaknesses have been exploited by terrorists with catastrophic results, these special interests are still fighting tooth and nail to preserve the loopholes in the law that make it easy for illegal aliens to enter and remain in the U.S.,” charged Stein. “For them, open borders trump all other considerations, including the security of our nation.

“We all support reforms of our intelligence agencies, but 9/11 was much more than just a failure of intelligence,” Stein continued. “Our immigration policies, which allowed the terrorists to enter the country in the first place, overstay their visas without consequence, acquire driver’s licenses, Social Security cards and other vital identity documents, open bank accounts, rent safe houses, were as much a factor in the events of 9/11 as the failures of the CIA and the FBI. That’s why the Commission’s recommendations included immigration reforms. They are in the report for the ACLU and everyone else to see starting on page 383. As Casey Stengel used to say, ‘You can look it up.’”