Traffic in Houston

You might think a proposal to force undocumented immigrants to be background checked, fingerprinted, photographed and entered into a database would be an easy sell with Republican lawmakers. But, you’d be wrong.

With time quickly running out in the legislative session, a plan to make it possible for undocumented immigrants to obtain a driver permit has stalled in legislature. The idea’s Republican champion in the House, Rep. Byron Cook of Corsicana, said the process has slowed way down but he’s still hopeful the proposal can become law. “Right now, we are pushing a big rock uphill,” he told me.

If enacted, undocumented immigrants would be able to legally drive but only if they submitted to all the things I mentioned, including that background check. If conservatives truly worry that some of these people may be here to do us harm, why wouldn’t we take advantage of the state’s criminal background check capabilities?

The plan was passed out of a House committee with bipartisan support after law enforcement gave it a strong endorsement. Austin’s police chief Art Acevedo said it would “Absolutely enhance the safety of all Texans.” He added that the most common headache his department deals with is when drivers call to say they’ve been hit by someone without car insurance who then flees the scene.

And that’s where this directly affects nearly every Texan. If your car is hit by someone without a license or one of these permits, that means they’ll be driving without insurance. Reputable companies will not sell car insurance to someone without a license. Director of the Department of Public Safety, Steve McCraw, testified “You’re not going to get the insurance unless you have a permit to drive.” If someone runs into me and my family, the first question on my mind will be whether they have proof of insurance, not proof of citizenship.

Why are we here?

Sen. Tommy Williams, R-The Woodlands

A change in the law in 2011 pushed by Sen. Tommy Williams, R-The Woodlands, makes it now impossible for undocumented drivers in Texas to renew their licenses. Williams says he was simply bringing the Texas driver’s license into compliance with the federal REAL ID Act, which means a person must be in compliance with federal immigration laws to get a photo ID. I believe Williams was acting in good faith, but the net effect is we now have a problem in the form of 2 million undocumented drivers who cannot renew their licenses. Let’s be crystal clear: Thousands had already legally obtained a license and now they cannot renew them.

The new driver permits, by law, could not look anything like the driver’s license you’re used to. The DPS would design them to look like a certificate. They could not be used to board an airplane or vote, which is a worry of some grassroots conservatives. I don’t share their concern on that last point, since Democratic and Republican activists alike will tell you it is difficult enough to get Hispanic citizens to the polls, let alone the undocumented.

With the legislative session ending in a couple weeks, supporters of this common sense reform are trying to stay optimistic.

“The fat lady hasn’t sung,” said Norman Adams, a longtime GOP booster who successfully argued last year for the Texas Republican Party to endorse a guest worker program in its platform. “Just about every Republican legislator I’ve talked to privately says they’re for the policy,” Adams said. “What they’re worried about is politics. They don’t want a primary opponent beating them up in a 30 second spot that’s all about how they gave something to illegals.”

When I’ve tried to ask some Republican lawmakers about this at the capitol, they scurried away muttering about how they didn’t have time to talk. Next time you or a loved one is in a car wreck, I hope the other driver doesn’t take off just as quickly because these lawmakers stood in the way of them buying insurance.

This column originally appeared in the Dallas Morning News.

“There have been many ideas brought forth in the past few months of what Texas is, and what it should become. We are not all in agreement. But I’d like to ask each of you what it is you value so highly that you are willing to fight and possibly die for? We will call *that* Texas.”

Gov. Rick Perry, R-Texas, delivers his 2013 State of the State Address

Gov. Perry avoided the hot button issues of abortion, immigration and gun control so that he could instead focus on the infrastructure needs of Texas in his State of the State address. Aman Batheja has the details over at the Texas Tribune.

While many in the Austin chattering class have been trying to figure out if he’ll run for re-election, setting himself up for another possible run for the presidency, there’s growing sentiment that Perry is ready to ride off into the political sunset after this legislative session is over.

This is an art, not a science so stay with me here.

If the governor wants to stay viable with the conservative base without hyper-focusing on social issues, talking about “tax relief”  is a nifty way to thread the needle. That’s what Perry did today, but it’s worth noting he headlined a “right to life” rally on the south steps of the capitol on Saturday. At that rally, Attorney General Greg Abbbott, who is likely running for governor in 2014, praised Perry as the most pro-life governor in America. If Abbott expects to face off against Perry in a primary, I’m not sure he’d be providing the Perry campaign with quotes like that.

Seems to me the two men have probably talked about this, Perry said he’s moving on, and the torch will be passed to Abbott. But, I’m just guessing about that. So is everyone else.

Harvey Kronberg at the Quorum Report has previously reported that it is entirely possible Perry will not name any emergency items this session, which would clear the way for the legislature to have what Speaker Joe Straus hopes will be a “serious” session about serious issues.

The last time Perry embraced a big push on infrastructure, it was back when he was the champion of the now mothballed Trans Texas Corridor. For that, he suffered blistering attacks from conservatives around the state who argued it was a massive land grab and an all out assault on private property rights. Perry eventually backed down and the ambitious tollroad plan is now just a memory.

In the last legislative session, Perry wanted lawmakers to leave the “rainy day fund” untouched – now he says it’s cool to take nearly $4 billion of it for water and roads. The backdrop for that: Perry was gearing up to run for president. The rhetoric is still conservative, but the governor’s positions are changing. That makes me think his plans are, too.

Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas

Texas has an estimated 1.7 million undocumented immigrants living between the Red and Rio Grande Rivers. Houston alone is home to about 600,000 of those. Texas has a 1,200 mile border with Mexico (the longest of any state). Texas has a booming Latino population that sees almost every other issue through the lens of immigration.

What Texas does not have, apparently, is leaders in Washington willing to knock down doors to be included in how the nation will fix its dysfunctional immigration system.

As President Barack Obama begins his push for reform, a bipartisan group of senators unveiled their plan this week. They are Republicans Marco Rubio of Florida, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, and John McCain and Jeff Flake of Arizona along with Democrats Charles Schumer of New York, Dick Durbin of Illinois, Michael Bennet of Colorado and Robert Menendez of New Jersey.

Conspicuously absent are Sen. John Cornyn and Ted Cruz, both Republicans from Texas.

What’s going on? It’s not as if Texans don’t understand the need for reform. It’s not even as if Texas Republicans don’t understand the need for reform.

In 2011, the Texas Republican leadership in Austin killed about 100 Arizona-style immigration bills that had been filed. Delegates to the Texas Republican Party Convention voted 2 to 1 to support a guest worker program for people in the country illegally.

Delegates to the national Republican Party’s convention were so inspired by what was happening in Texas that they also voted to include a guest worker provision in their platform. Texas Agriculture Commissioner Todd Staples, who is a Republican just like every other statewide officeholder, has spoken repeatedly of the need for a guest worker program.

Texas House Speaker Joe Straus, R-San Antonio, pointed to the state and national platforms as signs of real progress. “There were a number of us that were understanding the awkward position that many people in this party were taking,” Straus said in Austin this week. “As a state policymaker, I welcome bipartisan solutions. And as a state policymaker in the most important border state, I’m very anxious for them to be successful.”

Given all that, why aren’t Cruz and Cornyn at the forefront of the immigration discussions in Washington?

I’ll answer that for you: People with no common sense decided on your behalf that Texas leaders should be afraid.

During last year’s race to succeed Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, Cruz campaigned using the tired “anti-amnesty” rhetoric that resonates with the fewer than 5 percent of registered Texas voters who bothered to show up for the primary runoff. Opponent David Dewhurst was so afraid of that small number of fired-up voters that he had his staff delete a 2007 speech from his website in which he talked about the need for a guest worker program.

Cornyn is likewise afraid of that small percentage of the electorate who will be just as fired up and ready to vote against him in a primary if he supports reforms that don’t include nonsense ideas like “self-deportation.”

It is really unfortunate that a leader like Cornyn isn’t helping craft this policy. He has a breadth of knowledge on immigration, is attuned to the needs of the Texas business community and as a San Antonio native, he understands the cultural implications of inaction.

Immigration is an issue that presents unique challenges to Texas. For good or bad, our social and economic destiny is inextricably linked to how the nation will address it. Our leaders should show courage and demand a seat at the table.

This column originally appeared in the Dallas Morning News.

Let me explain.

One of the most overlooked reasons we have a diminished middle class is the erosion of the employer-employee relationship. Decades ago, most people were the employee of a company where they would work for 30 or more years, then retire with a gold watch and a pension. Not anymore. In construction, trucking and numerous other professions, that relationship has been replaced by a system in which companies shun the hiring of employees in favor of making them “independent subcontractors.”

This intentional misclassification of workers, also known as payroll fraud, is how some companies avoid paying minimum wage, payroll taxes and workers’ compensation coverage.

Also, this is precisely how so many companies end up with illegal immigrants working on their projects. People often ask, “Who hires all these illegal immigrants?” The answer in most cases is that they, in effect, hire themselves. If they work as a contractor, they are their own boss and are therefore responsible for their own taxes and health coverage.

This is so prevalent in the construction industry that researchers at the University of Texas say more than 40 percent of such workers across the state are the victims of payroll fraud. That’s more than 300,000 workers and about $7 billion in wages not reported to the Texas Workforce Commission. This causes the state to miss out on at least $54 million in unemployment insurance each year. The feds lose untold billions in Social Security payments.

If you think it doesn’t affect you, consider this: When those workers get hurt on the job and they’re dropped off at Parkland with no health insurance or workers’ comp, who picks up the tab? How does it feel to subsidize the labor costs of companies that rake in millions, if not billions, of dollars each year? A former construction worker who suffered a spinal cord injury when he fell on a job site in Houston pointed out to me this cruel irony: If a piece of the building fell, there’s insurance to cover replacing that inanimate object, but many of the people on the job had no coverage at all.

I’m sympathetic to conservative arguments against increased regulation of almost any business. But this is a rule-of-law issue, and legitimate businesses can’t compete with those who cheat. That’s why more and more conservative Republicans in state leadership are saying Texas must crack down on this growing problem.

Texas Workforce Commissioner Tom Pauken, a Republican and a proud former member of the Reagan administration, recently spearheaded the commission’s unanimous support for rooting out payroll fraud on all government contracts in Texas. After the Texas Construction Association, a trade group, testified before the commission that legitimate business can be underbid by cheaters by as much as 25 percent, Pauken said,  “This is a problem that has to be corrected, and we’ve come up with a workable solution.”

State Sen. John Carona, R-Dallas, has instructed his staff at the Senate Business and Commerce Committee, which he chairs, to start drafting legislation similar to what dozens of other states have passed.

“The message is unmistakable,” Carona told me. “Winners don’t cheat, and the cheaters’ day is over. I will be working with stakeholders, using what we’ve learned in many other states, to close the loopholes and restore fair competition to the construction industry.”

Most of the builders in North Texas I contacted about this issue did not respond, but those that did said they generally support what Carona wants to do. David Bloxom, president of Speed Fab-Crete in Fort Worth, said: “This misclassification activity puts a competitive disadvantage on those companies who fairly report their workers’ classifications correctly and fairly. We do plan to follow the development of the legislation specifics and offer our input as opportunity arises.”

It looks like this legislative session in Austin is going to be full of legislation on a host of red-meat issues as varied as additional restrictions on abortion and guns in school classrooms. Those debates promise to be nasty and partisan, but dealing with companies that are cheating their workers and taxpayers alike should be a bipartisan no-brainer. Let’s hope lawmakers approach it that way.

This column originally appeared in the Dallas Morning News.

WKBT-TV Morning Anchor Jennifer Livingston

I’ve interviewed many doctors who all say one of the most difficult conversations they can have is telling a parent their child is obese. But, they say investing in the sensitivity and care that goes into that conversation is worth it because it’s the first step in turning around a young person’s life. The magic, they say, is in initiating the conversation so the parents have accurate information and can plot a course for what to do next.

This is why I was  more than a little aghast when a news anchor from Wisconsin lashed out at a viewer who wrote an email to her pointedly addressing her weight. Ken Krause, the viewer, wrote to WKBT news anchor Jennifer Livingston “Surely you don’t consider yourself a suitable example for this community’s young people, girls in particular.” Livingston took to the airwaves to say it was a “personal attack” and “If you are at home and you are talking about the fat news lady, guess what? Your children are probably going to go to school and call someone fat.”

That set off a national firestorm with many saying Krause should be ashamed of himself.

And that’s the problem: Anyone who brings up a person’s obesity is told it’s just something you don’t talk about. While Krause’s tact in no way resembles the care of those doctors I mentioned, his point is not invalid.

Here in Texas, the costs are being discussed. Dr. Eduardo Sanchez, the chief medical officer of Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Texas, recently said “Obesity is costing us in terms of productivity in the workplace and competitiveness with our fellow states, and I would argue even other countries.” This is an economic epidemic. The Comptroller’s Office says obesity could cost businesses across Texas as much as $32.5 billion per year by 2030.

Nationwide, it’s estimated that annual costs for prescription drugs, emergency room treatment and outpatient services related to childhood obesity total more than $14 billion, with an additional $238 million in inpatient hospital costs.

Conservatives will no doubt argue that parents are to blame for the size and related health problems of their children. To some extent, they’re right. But, I would argue we have a social responsibility to make sure parents have better options when it comes to decisions that will ultimately cost us all more for health care.

The more this conversation is removed from politics, the more sense people tend to make.

Former Texas Health and Human Services Executive Commissioner Tom Suehs has said he would have gotten in trouble for saying so when he was in office, but he now supports consideration of a soda tax to discourage consumption of the sugary stuff. He likened it to the way we tax tobacco to both discourage its use and defray costs associated with the health problems caused by those products.

In New York, Mayor Michael Bloomberg has taken a lot of heat for banning sweetened drinks larger than 16 ounces. Former President Clinton has said it’s a “tragedy” that people are putting that much sugar into their bodies on a daily basis. In Richmond, California, voters are getting ready to decide whether to implement a soda tax and whether to use the money it would collect for more playgrounds to fight childhood obesity.

While the debate rages about whether a TV viewer in Wisconsin was way out of line to point out an obvious problem, somewhere a doctor is getting ready to, as gently as possible, break the news to a loving parent that their child has that same problem. There are things we can all do to help that parent fix it.

This column originally appeared in the Dallas Morning News.

Cheerleaders in Kountze, Texas.

There are two major religions in Texas: Christianity and high school football. Fortunately for our governor-in-waiting, Attorney General Greg Abbott, a story out of East Texas this week gives him a chance to pander to people of both faiths.

Cheerleaders in the Kountze ISD, northeast of Houston, have been writing Christian slogans on the banners the football players burst through before their games on Friday nights. These are the banners usually adorned with catchy phrases like “Womp the Wampus Cats,” “Explode the Exporters,” “Hurt the Hippos,” or “Vanquish the Vandals.” Yes, those are all actual mascot names for Texas high schools. The cheerleaders in Kountze felt the need to add additional inspiration like Philippians 4:13: “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” One player was quoted as saying “It means I’m playing for the Lord Jesus and my teammates.” And, no doubt, for the cheerleaders shakin’ their behinds in true Christian fashion.

Oh, to be lone liberal in a place like Kountze, Texas must be a miserable existence. It could drive a person to the kind of bitterness that makes you pick up the phone or write a letter to the folks at the Freedom from Religion Foundation. The group says it received complaints about the Christian banners and they’ve demanded a stop to the sideline evangelizing. The argument from the foundation is that the cheerleaders are official representatives of the school and have the kind of access to the football field during a game that other students don’t have. So, they’re able to push a message other students could not. The school district agreed, but a conservative group filed sued and a judge decided the banners are OK for now.

Attorney General Abbott says his office is ready to assist should the Kountze ISD need help versus Godless liberals. In a letter to the district Abbott wrote, in part:

Think about it: Can a school district or the Freedom From Religion Foundation stop a student from making the sign of the cross before taking a test, or stop football players from pointing toward heaven after scoring a touchdown or kneeling to pray for an injured teammate? Of course not. Just like the cheerleaders’ banners, such public displays of religion are voluntary expressions of the students’ beliefs and are not attributable to the school district.

Abbott, Gov. Perry, and GOP Senate Nominee Ted Cruz are united in this quest to slay secularism. Gov. Perry recently said on a conference call with Evangelicals that separation of church and state is the work of Satan.

As a Christian myself, I admit it’s difficult for me to get upset about Christian slogans on a football banner, regardless of whether they’re legal. My belief system says there’s room in God’s plan for either team to win the football game on Friday night. But, that’s just me.

It was suggested to me that an “Allahu Akbar” banner would result in a riot. No, it would not. The riots and anti-American violence blanketing much of the Mid East right now should remind us that back in this country we deal with our religious and political differences without shooting at each other. That’s a big part of why I like America. Even though we start some government meetings with prayers, our nation in no way resembles places like Syria, Egypt or Saudi Arabia.

My question isn’t “Why do Republicans like Perry and Abbott make these strong appeals to Evangelical Christians?” No. What I’d like to know is why I see so few Democrats doing anything similar. I’m asked all the time why Texas is so solidly Republican. I’m aware that there are scant resources for the Texas Democratic Party, but values aren’t in short supply if party leaders want to articulate them and stop ceding that people of faith are always going to largely side with the GOP.

Liberals, or progressives, constantly allow themselves to be the ones on the wrong side of these fights over how much religion should play a role in public discourse. Instead of engaging in a dialogue with the community about why anyone thinks God has a stake in the Kountze Lions versus the Hardin Hornets (Kountze won, by the way), liberals too often draw a line in the sand that puts almost else everyone on on the other side.

Liberals who win, like Bill Clinton, are the ones who embrace people of faith, not reject them.

Texas is up against its debt limit for roads.

Texas might be able to settle one of the central arguments in the race for the White House: Whether business owners create wealth and jobs on their own or whether we all chip in to make that happen. But, first Texas will have to decide what it’s going to do.

The Republicans, led by their nominee Mitt Romney, hold that business builds infrastructure and that without entrepreneurs there would be no new roads.

Tea Party star Sen. Rand Paul, R-Kentucky, said at the Republican National Convention “I was first insulted, then I was angered, then I was saddened that anyone in our country, much less the president of the United States, believes that roads create business success and not the other way around.”

Paul was, of course, referring to President Obama’s now famous quote: “Somebody helped to create this unbelievable American system that we have that allowed you to thrive. Somebody invested in roads and bridges.  If you’ve got a business, you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen.”

So which is it? Does business create roads or do we all pay for roads and then business and everyone else uses them? In the job-creating economic powerhouse that is Texas, the answer has been pretty straightforward: The government takes on debt to build roads demanded by business.

In fact, the state is about to reach its debt-limit for building roads and there’s likely to be a fierce debate soon about how to expand infrastructure in anticipation of more growth in our economy and population. The legislature has already authorized the Department of Transportation to issue more than $17 billion in bonds, meaning the state will owe more than $31 billion to repay that over the next three decades.

When the game isn’t presidential politics, business owners will readily tell you the government should take the lead in expanding infrastructure. The Texas Association of Business, one of the most powerful lobbying groups in Austin, supports a $50 increase on vehicle registrations to pay for new roads and maintenance. That sounds like we would all be chipping in to keep this job-creatin’ engine turning, doesn’t it? Some have suggested much higher fees for renewing your driver license, but there’s no reasonable fee that could realistically come close to funding infrastructure across Texas.

I’ll host a panel on this in Austin this weekend at the annual Texas Tribune Festival. Hope to see you there.

San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro

When Americans see Texans on the national stage in 2012, they won’t be looking at the white faces of Gov. Perry or Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst. You might remember, the former was supposed to be president and the latter was supposed to be our next U.S. Senator. Instead, they’ll see the Latino faces of our likely next senator, Republican Ted Cruz and Democratic San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro. It was announced last week Castro’s been chosen to be the keynote speaker at the Democratic National Convention. Cruz, it was just announced, will speak to the Republican National Convention.

By choosing Castro as their keynote speaker, Democrats are once again telling us Latinos are important. But, I question whether they’re doing the work to win the Latino vote or even to get those folks to the polls. So far, the Democratic strategy seems to be a complex mix of waiting and hoping for Texas Republicans to screw up.

“They’re waiting for the demographics to catch up,” said political consultant Marc Campos, who says he’s simultaneously a loyal Democrat and one of the state party’s biggest critics. “Sure, Democrats can win that way but maybe not in my lifetime,” he laughed.

Campos says Democrats are only engaging voters in urban areas and completely ignoring the suburbs and rural Texas, where many so many Latinos now live. In fact, of the 360,000 Latinos registered to vote in Harris County, nearly 60 percent live in the suburbs. And they didn’t move there because the suburbs are Republican strongholds.

“They move out there because there’s housing they can afford and somebody told them the schools are better,” Campos said. Ignoring those voters is “serious messed up thinking on the part of Democrats. I don’t know what it’s going to take for them to get it.”

Texas GOP Senate Nominee Ted Cruz

For his part, Ted Cruz is already saying things on the national stage that will resonate with Latinos. He told Fox News Sunday Host Chris Wallace that “in my life I’ve never once have seen a Hispanic panhandler, because in our community, it would be viewed as shameful to be out on the street begging.” While those comments have received the most attention, they are perhaps not the most damaging for Cruz’s political adversaries.

“Do you know the rate of military enlistment among Hispanics is higher than any demographic in this country?” Cruz asked with a grin. Democrats consistently miss the mark on easy stuff this. Why is it every time a wounded veteran receives a free home, it’s given to him by a group associated with Republicans? The themes of faith, family, and military aren’t the ideas Latinos or anyone automatically associate with Democrats.

“We’re in an interesting moment right now when it comes to seeing a larger Latino presence in electoral politics and government,” said University of Texas Political Scientist James Henson. “But, how much connective tissue is there between the organic participation of Latinos driving an increase in Latino political leaders and the figures that get public attention and support from the party infrastructure?”

Campos, the Democratic consultant, pointed to the presidential primary in 2008 when Senators Clinton and Obama were vying for their party’s nomination. “At that time, people were saying ‘Texas Latinos will have a say’ and everyone was calling me to ask how they could get involved,” he said. “When people actually get the feeling their votes will make a difference, they’ll show up.”

A makeshift memorial pops up near the theater where 12 people were shot dead in Colorado.

There were two tragedies in America with high death tolls over the last week and I am taken aback by the difference in the reactions to them. One was a mass shooting in a Colorado movie theater that left 12 Americans dead. The other was a truck crash here in Texas that killed 14 undocumented immigrants.

Americans are moved, naturally, by things we can all relate to. The rampage in Colorado hits us where we live because going to a movie is normal. Enjoying a show with our friends or family is a necessary escape from the bustle of our everyday lives. After the shooting, it was rightly declared a “national tragedy.” Cable news shows almost immediately became a non-stop debate about whether to reform the nation’s gun control laws.

When I woke up last Friday morning and the news of the shooting had just begun to dominate the headlines, my 13-year-old asked “Are we still going to go to the movie or do you think we’ll get shot?” I wasn’t sure what to say. He’d been looking forward to the release of The Dark Knight Rises for about a year. The potential of an everyday fun activity turning deadly was now a part of our reality. I held him in my arms and assured him we’d be ok.

This truck, designed to seat 5, was packed with more than 20 humans when it crashed near Goliad, Texas.

My son and I cannot relate to being stuffed into the back of a pickup along with about 20 other people, but it’s a routine occurrence in the life of an undocumented immigrant. As they try to escape impoverished lives in countries where it’s not uncommon for women to give birth in garbage dumps, they are often shoved into tight spaces with little air to breathe, let alone room to move. Earlier this year, 9 undocumented immigrants died when a minivan crashed near McAllen. Back in 2003, 19 immigrants died after they were abandoned in the trailer of an 18-wheeler near Victoria. As the temperature in that trailer soared well above 100 degrees, witnesses said a 5-year-old boy was crying out “Daddy, daddy, I’m dying.” His father held him in his arms, undoubtedly assuring him that everything would be ok. The little boy was among the first to die.

Texas is home to an estimated 1.7 million undocumented immigrants. For the most part, they’re here to do things like hang the drywall in our homes, mow the lawns in our neighborhoods, clean dishes at our favorite restaurants and care for our children.

Since the crash near Goliad on Sunday night, I have wondered why a wreck that left more people dead than the theater shooting isn’t also viewed as a national tragedy. When I’ve voiced this concern, the question has been met with either blank faces or the all-too-easy common comment that “They’re illegals. They shouldn’t be here in the first place.” It’s as if their illegal entry into the United States, a misdemeanor, somehow makes them inhuman.

I picked up the phone and called someone who would hopefully make some sense of this.

“The crash is emblematic of a broken system,” said Charles Foster, an immigration attorney in Houston and an adviser to Presidents Bush and Obama. “There will be endless analysis, as there should be, of what went wrong in this young man’s life in Colorado. People will ask ‘how can we prevent this?’ With this truck crash, we know exactly what’s wrong,” Foster said. “These people aren’t coming in here to do harm. Many are traveling to visit ill relatives or they just want to be reunited with their breadwinner,” Foster said. “Why don’t we have a functional legal system where they can come in with some dignity?”

Foster suggests an overhaul of the nation’s immigration laws, like the failed attempt at reform championed by President George W. Bush, that would identify and tax currently undocumented immigrants so that they’re not forced to live under such bizarre circumstances.

The reasons why 12 Americans were gunned down in the shadows of a movie theater may never be known. But, we know the reasons these immigrants continue to die in the shadows of our society. Will we ever turn on the lights?