Posted on November 21, 2011

Alabama Law Pays Off: Unemployment Down Sharply After Crackdown on Illegal Aliens

John Hill, Stand With Arizona, November 20, 2011

The war against Alabama’s immigration law has intensified in recent weeks, with a Justice Department lawsuit, visits by DOJ officials, and a showdown over illegal alien children who have been pulled from Alabama schools. {snip}

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{snip} As illegals have fled the state by the tens of thousands, the jobs they took–particularly in poultry processing, building trades and transportation–are being filled once again by Alabama citizens. And the unemployment rate in the state has dropped as a result.

Alabama’s unemployment rate fell a half percentage point last month–five times more than the national average of 0.1%. And the drop is not seasonal because it is also a far larger drop than in surrounding states.

To further support this trend, in one heavily Hispanic county with one of the highest percentages of illegal alien labor, the drop has been far more dramatic. Alabama House Majority Leader Rep. Micky Hammon, (R-Decatur), said the huge drop in Marshall County showed the power of Alabama’s H.B. 56:

Hammond pointed to Marshall County, which he called “a known hotbed for illegal immigrant labor.” He said the rate there was 8.1 percent for October, down from 8.8 percent in September and 10 percent in June, when the immigration law was signed. “When Marshall County’s unemployment rate drops almost a full 2 percent since the law was signed, it’s difficult to deny the law is having a positive effect on employment,” Hammond said in his statement.

Marshall County Rep. Kerry Rich (R) told WAFF-TV how poultry plants in his county have rapidly replaced illegal workers with legal ones to do the jobs that we are endlessly told “Americans just won’t do”:

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