GOP Gubernatorial Candidates Boyd and Lee Tied to Organizations That Say Let Illegal Immigrants Stay

Opponents of  sanctuary city policies understand that these measures which shield criminal illegal aliens increase the risks to public safety.

All GOP gubernatorial candidates eventually issued statements opposing sanctuary city policies.

What is not addressed, however, in the debate over sanctuary city policies, is the negative impact from illegal immigration on the wages of American workers.

Ironically, the two GOP gubernatorial candidates that have highlighted their business successes in their campaigns, are each tied to an organization that promotes the alleged economic benefits from illegal immigration for Tennessee.

Randy Boyd is a named member of the Partnership for a New American Economy (PNAE), a coalition led by business leaders and chambers of commerce which formed to convince the public and policymakers that comprehensive immigration reform like the 2013 “Gang of Eight” amnesty bill would help grow the economy and create jobs for Americans.

Included in PNAE’s “15 key economic issues of immigration reform in America” are:

• Supporting legal status for the 11.4 million undocumented immigrants which PNAE says pay taxes and do the jobs American citizens won’t do, and despite being in the country illegally, “even start their own businesses.” In a 2014 Wall Street Journal oped, PNAE co-founder Rupert Murdoch said that illegal immigrants who are already here should be provided a path to citizenship.
• Supporting resettlement of refugees who PNAE says that after living in the U.S. between 16-25 years are earning well above the income of refugees who have been here for five years or less. Moreover, PNAE believes refugees are the answer to reviving aging and declining communities.
• Pushing state and local policymakers to support in-state college tuition for illegal immigrant students.

The PNAE’s Tennessee report estimates the “undocumented population”to be approximately 129,000. In the report, illegal alien workers are characterized as a “small but critical role in the workforce” supporting industries that would not otherwise “thrive without a pool of workers willing to take on highly labor intensive roles,” work which PNAE intimates the native-born population and legal immigrants, are unwilling to perform.

Another PNAE report issued during this year’s state legislative session promoted the economic benefits of rewarding illegal alien students with the reduced in-state tuition benefit.

The Nashville Chamber of Commerce (NCC) is also a named member of the PNAE. Along with the PNAE, the NCC is helping to spread liberal immigration policies including endorsing “strategies” to achieve the Drive to 55 education goals which state legislators said needed to include giving in-state tuition to illegal alien students.

PNAE’s report, A Crucial Piece of the Puzzle: Demographic Change and Why Immigrants are Needed to Fill America’s Less-Skilled Labor Gap (PDF), suggests that the demographic crisis facing the U.S. economy can only be rescued with legal and illegal immigrant workers.

The Lee Company which Bill Lee now serves as Chairman, is a “Bronze Level Investor (Minimum contribution is $25,000 over 5 years) in the Nashville Chamber of Commerce’s Partnership 2020.