Alabama Congressman Mo Brooks regularly attends anti-immigrant gatherings and was a vocal proponent of Alabama’s harsh anti-immigrant law, HB 56. Brooks is an ardent opponent of allowing undocumented immigrants to serve in the U.S. military. At a town hall in June of 2011, the Alabama congressman claimed he would do “anything short of shooting” undocumented immigrants to remove them from the U.S.
About
- Rep. Brooks has openly associated with the anti-immigrant lobby for years, and has participated at events with FAIR and CIS.
- He is a regular attendee at FAIR’s annual “Hold Their Feet to the Fire” event, and in addition to citing FAIR’s research on the House floor, he has attended multiple events sponsored by CIS.
- Brooks touts CIS’s endorsement of legislation he sponsors, and was a recipient of Tanton’s political action committee USIRPAC in 2018.
Anti-immigrant Views
- In March 2019, Brooks read from Hitler’s “Mein Kampf” to attack Democrats alleging that they had pushed a “big lie” to smear President Trump during the Mueller investigation. The Alabama Holocaust Commission condemned Brooks’s remarks in a statement: “Such facile comparisons, used in order to demean opponents and gain political capital, should be actively avoided. Using such rhetoric not only trivializes our past, as well as the victims of this genocide, but also cheapens our current discourse and maintains a divisive rhetoric all too common at the present time.”
- On Alabama’s destructive HB 56, Brooks claimed that reports of Latinx students staying home from school were the intended outcome of the legislation.
- Brooks complained that criticism of Senator Sessions’s dismal record on civil rights amounted to a “war on whites,” a phrase he had used in 2014. Unsurprisingly Brooks went back on his agreement with then RNC Chair Reince Priebus to stop using the divisive language.
- The Alabama Congressman supports revoking the 14th Amendment and cosponsored Rep. King’s H.R.140, the Birthright Citizenship Act of 2019, which would eliminate granting automatic citizenship to the U.S.-born children to undocumented parents. He also supported the elimination in 2011, 2013, 2015 and 2017.
- In 2013, as Congress was considering an immigration compromise, Brooks joined Reps. Barletta and Lamar Smith, and Senator Sessions on a CIS teleconference to argue against it. Also in 2013, Brooks spoke at a rally organized by an anti-immigrant front group, along with Rep. Steve King and Senators Sessions and Cruz.
Anti-immigrant Activity
- Brooks has been a proponent for harsh immigration policies for years including building a wall at the Southern border, limiting protections for Temporary Protective Status recipients, promoting a monumental reduction of legal immigration, and banning the entry of individuals from predominantly Muslim countries.
- In May 2018, Brooks filed a lawsuit against the Census Bureau for counting undocumented immigrants in the Census, though the Administration asked for the case to be dismissed.
- Brooks has been a strident opponent of allowing Dreamers to serve in the U.S. military, and has previously introduced legislation to prevent DACA recipients from doing so.
- In 2014, Brooks warned his colleagues that “all hell will break loose” if they supported legislation that would allow Dreamers to serve and be “on equal footing with American citizens for jobs in the military.”
- Additionally, Rep. Brooks cautioned lawmakers against supporting former Congressman Jeff Denham’s ENLIST Act on the premise of their possible disloyalty to the U.S.
- Congressman Brooks defended President Trump’s decision to declare a national emergency in order to fund the construction of a wall along the Southern border, claiming the lack of a border wall had led to the loss of American lives, and compared it to 9/11 casualties.
- In 2018, Brooks expressed support for President Trump’s plan to deploy National Guard troops to the Southern border “against an invasion of foreign nationals,” until Congress funded a border wall.