2018 Gov’s Playbook: Fung & Raimondo Battle Over Immigration — Who Is a Liar?
Monday, August 13, 2018
Two issues exploded this week: immigration and accusations of lying.
The emerging issue in the Rhode Island’s governor’s race of immigration is growing into a wildly divisive one. At the top level, it may turn into a referendum on President Donald Trump and open borders.
Mayor Allan Fung of Cranston signed an agreement with the Department of Justice promising that federal immigration officials will be contacted when a criminal in custody is in this country illegally.
GET THE LATEST BREAKING NEWS HERE -- SIGN UP FOR GOLOCAL FREE DAILY EBLAST"The number one responsibility of our government, whether it's the City of Cranston or the State of Rhode Island, is protecting our citizens. We have a lot of work to do. Unfortunately, under Governor Raimondo, Rhode Island had the highest murder rate in the region in 2016. The steps we have taken this week ensure that criminals who are here illegally will be identified to federal authorities, so that they cannot continue to commit crimes in our city," said Mayor Fung.
"When I'm Governor, we will not be protecting criminals who are in this country illegally, period. We will not be a sanctuary state, and I will fight against sanctuary cities like Providence. Governor Raimondo's policies at the Department of Corrections are creating an unsafe situation for our families. We need only look at the Ramon Delossantos case where a repeat drug offender, in this country illegally, was not reported to ICE upon leaving the ACI, and went right back to becoming one of the state's biggest opioid kingpins within a year," said Fung.
On Thursday, Providence and Central Falls Mayors Jorge Elorza and James Diossa announced they were suing the federal government.
“Does Governor Raimondo support Mayor Elorza's lawsuit? Does she believe Providence and the state of Rhode Island should be sanctuaries for criminals who are also here illegally? Law abiding citizens have a right to know where Governor Raimondo stands on enforcing the law,” said Fung.
“At the heart of Central Falls' turnaround in recent years has been the community-oriented nature of our police department, made, in part, possible by Byrne JAG funding. We are hopeful that the federal court will order that Central Falls can continue to receive this important funding without the requirement that our police officers become agents of a broken, federal immigration system,” said Diossa.
“When I'm Governor, Rhode Island will NOT be a sanctuary state! Because of Governor Raimondo's policies, a criminal who was in this country illegally was shielded from immigration officials upon his release from the ACI,” said Fung in a Facebook post.
Debate Debate Continues -- Charges of Lying
Both Raimondo and Fung continue to refuse to conduct public debates with their opponents. Raimondo’s campaign claims that they won’t debate Matt Brown because he is a “liar.” But, the campaign refuses to disclose his lies. The only issue the Raimondo claimed was a “lie” was his position on “oil money.”
“Brown said he took over $40k from Big Oil in his last campaign because he didn’t understand "the urgency of the climate change crisis" at the time -- even though he gave multiple speeches during the same period calling global warming a 'serious global threat.' Any 10-year-old can see right through his lies,” said Emily Samsel of the Raimondo campaign.
When asked for specifics Samsel said, “Matt Brown’s entire campaign is fundamentally dishonest. He is all over the place — Monday night he told a room of seniors that the Governor was going to take away their health care, earlier this year he announced he was seeking the Democratic nomination while still registered Independent, his field organizers are telling voters that Governor Raimondo is closely aligned with Trump, he falsely claims that Governor Raimondo cut Medicaid and in 2006 he pretended he didn’t know about the Hawaii money laundering scheme his campaign orchestrated.” But, Raimondo’s campaign has refused to support the claims.
Brown’s campaign fired back. “You can’t just call someone a liar to distract from an issue. The real issue is that voters deserve to hear candidates speak on the important topics in a debate, not just from packaged, 30-second TV ads,” said Juliet Barbara.
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