Game and set

[pecunium]

Match to follow.

Two state employees suspected of compiling list in Utah

The governor made a statement, two employees have been placed on administrative leave, the various levels of the Republican Party (at least in Utah) have said good things, and Kirsten Cox, head of the state department the employees worked for said, ""The people we have identified certainly have some very strong political opinions and are frustrated," Cox said, about the issue of illegal immigration. "If they want to go rogue, they need to quit the department."

Governor Herbert went on to say the only sources for the information were Medicaid files and assistance programs which the children of undocumented residents; who are citizens, are entitled to use.

Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff said during a separate event Friday that once information from the governor's investigation is turned over to his office by Monday, "We will begin an immediate, aggressive, formal investigation.

"We'll do that jointly with the U.S. attorney's office, because from what we're hearing, mostly likely federal and state privacy laws may have been violated. We're talking serious crimes that could rise to a felony," he said.

Utah Republican Party Chairman Dave Hansen said in a statement Friday that the party supported Herbert's request for an investigation into the origination and release of the list.

"The unlawful release of private information to the public is unconscionable under any circumstances and is not to be tolerated," Hansen said in the statement. "Immigration is an emotional and much-debated issue, not only here in Utah, but nationwide. However, flaunting the law because of frustration with the law is no excuse for illegal behavior.

That, my friends, is a good thing. Even if you think there is a lack of sincerity, the public rhetoric, the stand for law and order (even when it contradicts some of the party's planks) is good for the commonweal.

Two people. At this point, if there were more, we'll find out, but I suspect it's just the two of them.

Comments

[maps-or-guitars.livejournal.com]

Snerk:

"We need to do it in a way that is not through lists, that is through hate mongering, through political rhetoric, through threats, through outright and implied racism. That's not how we do things, and we condemn it."

I know what the man's TRYING to say, but he sort of accidentally said the opposite once he hit the first comma.

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

Not his fault; blame the reporter/editor.

Esp. in a spoken format, there is almost certainly no ambiguity.

[maps-or-guitars.livejournal.com]

I'm sure that's the case. I'm just being twelve.

[songblaze.livejournal.com]

...I'd also like to know when the debate on immigration got away from hate mongering, political rhetoric, and racism. I've certainly never seen any debate on immigration that didn't include at least one, more frequently two, and often all three.

[fidelioscabinet.livejournal.com]

This doesn't surprise me.

[harimad.livejournal.com]

The part I don't like is
there are only two areas where people can access information about undocumented people: those who are receiving prenatal care through Medicaid, and those whose children are U.S. citizens and qualify for food stamps, health care and other assistance.

As a result of this criminal act, illegals are going to avoid getting important legal services for their citizen children. Not only is this not good for those children, it's not good for the rest of us either. Just for example, kids who get sick get other kids sick, and kids who get sick don't get as good an education as those who don't.

[chaotic-nipple.livejournal.com]

Two people. At this point, if there were more, we'll find out, but I suspect it's just the two of them.

Who will soon have a regular spot as commentators on Fox News.

[saoba.livejournal.com]

Because nothing says 'Real American Patriot Who Loves Freedom' like snooping through protected, confidential files. Unless it's snooping through protected and confidential files and releasing that information in direct contravention of all regulations governing handling such information.

Strong opinions do not exempt someone from properly handling the public trust placed in them. Investigate. Prosecute those found to be responsible.

In a perfect world, illegally obtained information pertaining to immigration status would be automatically barred from being used by immigration authorities. Make it clear to these nitwits that tainted evidence is not just useless but worse than useless.

THAT would shut this sort of nonsense down.

[starcat-jewel.livejournal.com]

I see a lot of comments describing these people as whistleblowers. Can you say "unclear on the subject"? What has been done here isn't whistleblowing by any definition; it's the illegal distribution of confidential information about individuals.

IMO as part of the sentence, there should be a web page created with the full story of what they did and including their pictures, names, addresses, and phone #s (all of which are publicly-available information), and it should stay up for at least a year.

[baron-elric.livejournal.com]

These two are almost certainly the types who are outraged at how intrusive Big Government is, gathering information about them in preparation for the arrival of the black helicopters to take all the Reel Paitriots (sic) away for brainwashing.

[apostle-of-eris.livejournal.com]

From the very beginning, one of the likeliest scenarios has been that it is a very small number of fools who will be caught fairly quickly.