By Joe Anuta
Ten City Council members were preparing to introduce a bill that would extend municipal voting rights to legal immigrants, but not all lawmakers are pushing for suffrage.
The potential bill would allow the city’s 1.3 million tax-paying immigrants who hold green cards — and about 500,000 live in Queens — to vote in local elections, according to a spokeswoman from I Vote New York City, an advocacy group.
That means that non-citizens could vote for the mayor, the city comptroller, the city public advocate, members of the City Council and the borough presidents.
“It’s an issue of plain fairness and democracy,” said Irma Rodriguez of Queens Community House, an organization that advocates the legislation. “A lot of things are decided by our legislative bodies that really affect people at the local level, and when you have a huge population who have no way to vote for the people who make these decisions then you’re losing something in the democracy.”
Queens Community House estimates that one in 10 New Yorkers cannot vote because of their citizenship status.
Rodriguez added that voting is more of an obligation to the community than a civil right that citizens can choose to ignore.
“It can only benefit all of us if people are more engaged,” she said.
The legislation was introduced by Councilman Daniel Dromm (D-Jackson Heights), who said it is based on one of the founding principles of our country.
“No taxation without representation,” he said, citing the fact that legal immigrants pay $18.2 billion in state income taxes, and send their children to public schools, put their parents in elderly homes — yet cannot vote in local elections.
“These taxpaying residents are disenfranchised,” he added. “This is a matter of fairness.”
And according to Dromm, the idea is nothing new. Until about the 1820s, non-citizens could vote provided they were property owners.
“As new and as novel as this idea may seem at first, it’s really just an extension of granting taxpayers a say in how their tax dollars are being used,” he said.
Similar bills have already passed in six towns in Maryland, he added.
But other lawmakers said that voting is a right of citizens only and encouraged legal immigrants to attain citizenship status in order to gain the same rights they enjoy in their native countries.
“They are entitled to vote in their elections,” said Councilman Dan Halloran (R-Whitestone). “When you’re a citizen of America, you have the right to decide America’s future. If it’s their intention to vote, they can become citizens.”
He added that legal immigrants do not have a vested interest in the community and are not considered when passing legislation.
“They’re not apportioned when we look at constituents,” he said. “That’s not how it’s done.”
Halloran also said that the legislation might run into legal trouble.
The language in it was vague, he said, and would be at risk for manipulation by people of questionable resident status.
“If somebody is here on a student visa or a work visa, that is generally intended to be a non-permanent,” he said. “They have no business voting.”
Halloran added that the measure might not even be legal, since the U.S. Constitution requires voters to be citizens and New York state requires them to be residents.
“It’s in violation of federal and state law,” Halloran said. “It has no chance.”
Reach reporter Joe Anuta by e-mail at januta@cnglocal.com or by phone at 718-260-4566.
