The House of Representatives wants to require the Library of Congress to refer to foreigners as “aliens” and undocumented immigration as “illegal.”
The House Appropriations Committee released its $3.5B 2017 legislative spending report Monday. It included this instruction to the Library:
{mosads}”To the extent practicable, the Committee instructs the Library to maintain certain subject headings that reflect terminology used in title 8, United States Code.”
Title 8 of the United States Code refers to “Aliens and Nationality,” and defines the term “alien” as “any person not a citizen or national of the United States.”
In March, the Library announced it would stop using the terms to refer to foreign nationals, switching instead to “non-citizens” and “unauthorized immigration.”
The move was celebrated by Hispanic groups who consider the term “illegal alien” pejorative, but panned by Republicans as an unnecessary appeal to political correctness.
While the law doesn’t explicitly refer to undocumented immigrants as “illegal aliens,” it does use the term “illegal” to describe unauthorized presence in the United States.