OKLAHOMA'S CRACKDOWN ON ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION DRAWS TEXAS LAWMAKERS' INTEREST

According to the Pew Hispanic Center, there were between 50,000 and 75,000 illegal immigrants in Oklahoma nearly two years ago, with 20 times more -- as many as 1.6 million -- in Texas.

Last year, Oklahoma's Legislature passed, by huge margins, the nation's toughest law on illegal immigrants that:

> Restricts illegal immigrants' access to driver's licenses and ID cards.
> Cuts off several forms of public assistance for illegal immigrants. Emergency medical care, disaster aid and certain immunizations are exempted.
> Makes it harder for illegal immigrants to pay in-state college tuition.
> Encourages state and local law enforcement to enforce federal immigration law.
> Makes it a felony to harbor, transport, conceal or shelter illegal immigrants.
> Starting this summer, requires private and government employers to use a federal database to verify employment eligibility of all new hires.
> Make public schools report how many illegal-immigrant children are enrolled.

Meanwhile, some Texas lawmakers are already promising bills that mirror Oklahoma's House Bill 1804, [saying] even as Congress deadlocks on immigration, a state can protect itself against what he calls threats to public health and safety posed by a porous border.

['restricts' not bans, 'several' not all, 'harder' not prevents, 'encourages' not requires, 'federal database' means we've had a way to verify employment eligibility for years - and not used it, 'public' means tax payer funded - but previously not disclosing how many illegal-immigrants we're paying for? And these mushy 'restrictions' and 'encouragements' represent "the nations toughest law on illegal immigrants"?]

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