Jamiel Shaw, a Los Angeles man whose son Jamiel Shaw, Jr., was murdered by a DREAM Act-qualified illegal alien who currently sits on death row, told Breitbart News he is formally withdrawing his endorsement of the SAFE Act immigration bill by Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC) because he fears it will be used as a vehicle to get amnesty for illegal aliens.
“When they came out with the SAFE Act, one of the main provision was they were going after the gangs and they were going to make that a deportable offense,” Shaw said in a phone interview on Tuesday. “The guy that murdered my son was a DREAMer. He was one of the so-called ‘DREAM Act kids’ and he would have been set under the DREAM Act and said he was ‘brought here under no fault of his own.’ Just because you were brought here under no fault of your own doesn’t mean you give amnesty to everybody.”
Shaw testified before the House Judiciary Committee on Thursday June 14, at which he recounted the story of how his son was murdered by the illegal alien three doors from their home while his mother served America’s military in Iraq. Jamiel Shaw, Jr., was 17-years-old and a football star at his local high school destined for Stanford University.
“According to the coroner who testified at the trial, Jamiel was shot in the stomach first and while he was lying on the ground with his hands covering his head pleading for his life, he was shot again,” Shaw testified before the Judiciary Committee in June, where he endorsed Gowdy’s bill. “The bullet went through his hand and straight into his head.” The illegal alien who killed Shaw’s son had been released early from jail by law enforcement authorities the night before after having been charged with assault with a deadly weapon and battery on a police officer.
Shaw said he still supports the individual merits of Gowdy’s bill, a law enforcement only bill with no amnesty provisions, but he feels the need to withdraw his endorsement of it because of the possibility House GOP leadership will combine it with a group of other bills in an effort to have a conference with the Senate, where amnesty has a good chance of passing.
“I like Trey Gowdy, but it seems like he ain’t running nothing,” Shaw said. “It seems like [House Judiciary Committee chairman Rep.] Bob Goodlatte [(R-VA)], [House Majority Leader] Eric Cantor and all of them are really running everything.”
As Breitbart News has reported, Goodlatte remains open to conferencing the Senate bill with a group of House bills. Cantor, meanwhile, is planning his own version of the DREAM Act called the “KIDS Act,” which he is releasing after the August recess. Cantor also said on Fox News Sunday this weekend that he and House Republican leadership are open to drafting an amnesty plan for all illegal aliens, not just some that would qualify under the Dream Act. House Budget Committee chairman Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) echoed that sentiment during a recent town hall in Racine, WI.
“We’re going to vote on a bill to legalize people who are undocumented,” Ryan said there, a remark that seems to contradict promises made by House Speaker John Boehner that there would be no vote on any bill that did not have the support of the majority of House Republicans.
Shaw said he does not want to be a part of anything in which a group bills, including the SAFE Act, is sent to conference with the Senate bill. “No, no, because I know they’re up to something and I’m not going to get caught up in that,” Shaw said in his phone interview with Breitbart News.
“You know, we’re trying to get enforcement for the Americans who were murdered by illegal aliens. The Republicans are acting like Democrats. Republicans want to do amnesty because they want to save their jobs. Bob Goodlatte knows I was specifically on board because they were going after gangs.
“I don’t really know what’s going on, they’re feuding and there’s Republicans going at each other. I don’t know what they’re doing so I don’t want to be a part of nothing like that. There’s too much going on now and it’s obvious they have a grand plan and I don’t want to be a part of that. It’s obvious that they want to do some kind of amnesty.”
Shaw said, too, that he thinks Cantor working on legalizing the immigration status of so-called DREAMers is “like a slap in the face to all the people whose kids were murdered by the so-called ‘DREAM Act kids,'” and referenced a recent report that Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ) was pleading with liberal activists at the Center for American Progress (CAP) to get lawmakers to a deal-cutting scenario in a conference between the House and the Senate.
“Then we’re hearing that Menendez and Bob Goodlatte and Eric Cantor and then everybody behind the scenes, that they’re working on some kind of amnesty plan,” Shaw said. “I don’t want to be a part of that. I was only in for the SAFE Act, because I thought it was going to do some enforcement with no amnesty–just enforcement only. Now we see that that’s not true. That’s not their plan. They know it, we know it. The word has gotten around that they’re getting ready to attach some kind of amnesty to the SAFE Act.”
Shaw added that he thinks House Republicans have let him down. “Paul Ryan was talking just the other day and he sounded just like Marco Rubio,” Shaw said. “He said he wants to bring them here and ‘out of the shadows,’ and make them pay a fine and speak English and do a civics program. Man, I don’t believe all that stuff.”
Shaw also said that he and Goodlatte have not spoken since that mid-June committee hearing and he is personally disappointed in the House Judiciary Committee chairman’s activities after it. Goodlatte, he said, has not contacted him since he formally withdrew his endorsement of the SAFE Act.
“We don’t even speak anyway,” Shaw said of Goodlatte. “It’s not like we’re friends, or chit-chat. I just came down because they wanted me to come down and talk about my son. I never talk to Bob Goodlatte, I never talk to Trey Gowdy. The only one I ever talked to before was Steve King and I support what he’s doing.
“Gowdy’s a straight guy and I like what he’s doing. Everything about the SAFE Act, I like. But it seems like they’re going to start putting everything with it. And before we know it, it’s going to be one big bill and there’s going to be amnesty to it.”
Spokespersons for Gowdy and Goodlatte did not respond to Breitbart News’ requests for comment.
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