Accelerating the pace of his move to the center-left in his race for the U.S. Senate as he looks to win Democratic voters from U.S. Rep. Kendrick Meek, Gov. Charlie Crist said Friday that Congress should have approved a bill that would allow undocumented minor immigrants to earn conditional permanent residency status if they get college degrees or join the military.
The bill, known as the Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors Act (DREAM Act), was attached to a defense appropriation bill voted down by the Senate which also contained a proposed repeal of the controversial “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” Policy in the military, which Crist said he also supported eliminating.
On the DREAM Act, which Meek, a Democrat, has pushed for recently, Crist said the argument against it by Republicans in the U.S. Senate was “ridiculous.”
“I wish it had passed in Congress,” Crist said during an editorial board meeting Friday with the Palm Beach Post. “The ridiculous argument the Republicans made was that you can’t put it in military and defense appropriations. You can do two things at once in America.”
Separately in Tallahassee, a group of Florida State University law students protested Sen. George LeMieux for opposing the DREAM Act. LeMieux was appointed to the Senate by Crist last year and managed his 2006 gubernatorial campaign.
The News Service of Florida
