Petition Drive Succeeds

Opponents of a new law that gives undocumented immigrants in-state tuition discounts at Maryland’s public colleges have gathered enough signatures to suspend the law and force a statewide referendum, election officials said Thursday.

It is the first time in 20 years that a petition drive has forced a vote on a Maryland law.

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Opponents needed at least 55,736 signatures, or 3 percent of those who cast ballots in the last statewide election, to push the measure to a vote in November 2012. The board reported Thursday that 63,118 signatures had been validated by local officials. Counting and certifications of signatures will continue for weeks because opponents turned in more than 130,000 signatures.

Neil Parrott and his team for putting this together. It was great work but it wasn’t cheap, if you can drop by Neil’s site and give what you can.

I have to admit being a skeptic when this project was launched. Getting verified signatures is tough, getting signatures that can withstand the assault of CASA Maryland and ACLU challenges. The petition volunteers have, on occasion, been harassed and the police have been called to remove volunteers from public property. In the end, however, democracy prevailed.

It is really a crying shame that we have to do this. The idea that our state is willing to accept self avowed criminals into college at in-state rates, while denying that same to American citizens who happen to be residents of other states rather than other countries. What was equally incredible about this law which was designed as nothing more than a magnet for illegals is that in order to participate the individuals had to have committed fraud. They were required to document that they had paid state income tax which you can only do if you have a social security number.

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Unfortunately as the kleptocratic O’Malley regime become more embedded in the Democratic oligarchy we may have to resort to this more frequently simply to protect what remains of freedom in Maryland.