As you probably know, Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake has made it her mission to increase Baltimore’s population by 10,000 families over the next 10 years (or wait, was it 10 families over the next 10,000 years? — yeah, that sounds more realistic). Well, she sees immigrants, particularly Latinos, as key to achieving that goal, and with good reason. In the 2010 census, most cities that showed population growth could credit it mainly to their Latino residents.
In March, the mayor signed an order “prohibiting police and social agencies from asking anyone about immigration status,” which is the first step of several in Rawlings-Blake’s plan. And it’s a smart one. Both documented and undocument immigrants tend to feel more welcome when they aren’t constantly being questioned about their legal status.
But of course, not everyone’s happy about that. Del. Patrick McDonough, for one, is critical of the mayor’s plan. Sure, he wants to increase the city’s population but not with illegal immigrants who are going to come here and take our jobs, but rather with legal resident… um… who are going to come here… and uh… take our jobs.
But if that logic is lost on you he’s also got some bigoted “dog whistle” statements he’s not afraid to throw around. Specifically, he doesn’t support reaching out to undocumented immigrants because of “all of the accompanying cultural and criminal issues associated with that policy.” Wink, wink.
It looks like the mayor won’t be tapping McDonough to head any immigrant welcoming committees.
