…President Bush asked the Senate to remove the obligation to pay back taxes from the compromise immigration bill. This little gambit seems to be slipping past the alarm sensors of the American public as the vote on the bill fast approaches.

This gets very sinister. The provision requiring that illegal aliens pay their back income taxes for a couple of years was in the version of the bill that was exposed to the American citizens. Then that provision was quietly removed. Later,

Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff, speaking in reference to illegal immigrants seeking legal status, said, “You’ve got to pay your taxes.”

BUT HE WAS ONLY REFERRING TO FUTURE TAXES! This seems like a deliberate attempt by political insiders to mislead the public. It also seems that our politicians deliberately floated this at the end of the week, so that we would all be tied up with weekend activities during the few remaining days before the Monday vote. Will the cable talk show fellows get all over this in time?

Pete Sepp, spokesman for the National Taxpayers Union … was stunned that the provision was removed. While saying it would be difficult to come up with a precise estimate of the amount of back taxes owed by undocumented residents, he said it would be in the tens of billions of dollars, with a similar amount in fines for failure to pay the taxes.

“I can tell you, most law-abiding taxpayers would find that provision totally distasteful,” Sepp said about the decision not to seek back taxes. “I doubt that many citizens are willing to swallow that special treatment.”