Yesterday during the second public hearing on HB 87 before the Georgia General Assembly’s House Judiciary Committee, the bill’s author and at least two sponsors presented a rather startling new tactic. They each stated, and the Chairman did so quite vociferously, that “HB 87 is NOT like the Arizona law.” The Chairman argued that it was very different from the Arizona, without actually distingushing how his allegation of non-similarlity was actually correct.
So, if HB 87 contains at least three of the controversial provisions found in the Arizona law, how is it NOT like the Arizona law? If HB 87 has as its primary purpose to chase immigrants out of Georgia, how is it NOT like the Arizona law? If HB 87 will have the same deliterious effects on the economy and small business, how is NOT like the Arizona law?
Mr. Chairman, if it walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then, it is a duck. HB 87 (and its companion piece SB 40), is like the Arizona law. You can say it ain’t so, and perhaps you can fool a few people, but we all know what is going on here.
