Pirate's Cove

The Mercury News’ Tatiana Sanchez asks a good question. The original headline wonders if it could affect. At some point it was changed to

Could Kate Steinle verdict torpedo Congress’ DACA deal?

A San Francisco jury shocked the nation Thursday when it found an undocumented immigrant not guilty of murder and involuntary manslaughter in the shooting death of Kate Steinle.

Now, with Congress’ deadline to salvage a program protecting young undocumented immigrants from deportation fast approaching, “Dreamers” and immigration advocates are left to wonder how the political tensions from such a polarizing case — one that quickly reignited a decadeslong national debate on illegal immigration — will affect the program’s chances of survival.

Political analysts said the explosive verdict will probably make it more difficult for Congress to pass the long-proposed Dream Act, but they disagreed on whether it will be a fatal blow.

Sanchez offers various opinions from people on both sides, who all agree this might make it more difficult to pass.

Like Valenciano, other Dreamers and many legal analysts on Friday said that while the verdict will surely intensify opposition to illegal immigration among conservatives, it won’t deter Congress from passing Dreamer legislation, particularly given that young undocumented immigrants have garnered significant bipartisan support. However, they acknowledge that it will now be a tougher fight.

“I don’t necessarily think it’s going to impact legislation as a whole in terms of whether or not Congress chooses to pass a Dream Act,” said Luisa Tembo, a DACA recipient from Oakland. “But I do think it will have more of an influence on people’s perspective on undocumented immigrants in this country.”

We don’t know what will happen yet, but, you can bet that one outcome is that the illegal alien Dreamers and their supporters will not get the clean bill they have been demanding. There will surely be lots of enforcement measures within an DACA bill, and possibly measures to crack down on sanctuary cities. And, if they’re smart, they will crack down on chain migration. As it stands, their parents should already be forced to leave the country, since, per illegal alien supporter talking points, they were the “sinners”. You know that won’t happen. But, if Dreamers are given some sort of legal status, they should not be allowed to bring others in. Ever.

“As we move into the 2018 (political) season, I think this could make it more difficult for some Republicans — especially those up for re-election — to be willing to compromise on DACA,” Jackson said. “They don’t want to appear to be soft on crime or to be compromising too much with Democrats.

“This is clearly going to put the focus back on border security and making sure that immigrants who have committed crimes are held accountable for those crimes,” she added. “Unfortunately, if I were a Dreamer, I would be very worried right now about what this means for my future.”

We’ll see what happens. Especially if Democrats try to scuttle any budget deal over DACA. It won’t play well if they refuse to fund the government in support of illegal aliens who kill Americans.