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yet another 'who / whom / they / them' question

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by jsk173 » Mon Aug 09, 2010 11:51 am
I'm usually good at the "who" vs. "whom" problem, but this sentence from a Washington Times article has me stumped:

"'But at the same time, the Obama administration is giving a free pass to any illegal immigrant who they decide is not dangerous enough.'"

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/201 ... ls/?page=3

It seems like the "who" above is serving as an object of the verb "decide" and, thus, should have been "whom," but trying the old "they" vs. "them" replacement yields what seems like a counterintuitive result. If anyone can explain the proper usage here, I'd appreciate it. Thanks very much.
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by Brian@VeritasPrep » Mon Aug 09, 2010 5:47 pm
Hey JSK,

Interesting - my read on this one is that "they decide" is a modifier, and that "who" is the subject of "is dangerous enough".

You could rewrite it as:

...a free pass to any immigrant who is not dangerous...

So you'd say "he is not dangerous" and not "him is not dangerous", therefore using "who" and not "whom".

Tricky...but compliments to the editorial staff at the Washington Times!
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by dinesh19aug » Mon Aug 09, 2010 9:23 pm
IMO, the usage of "Who" in washington post is correct, because who here refers to "Any immigrant", which is singular.
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by jsk173 » Fri Aug 20, 2010 2:06 pm
Thanks for the replies. Interesting.
dinesh19aug wrote:IMO, the usage of "Who" in washington post is correct, because who here refers to "Any immigrant", which is singular.
Right, but if "any immigrant" was the object, then it would require "whom."
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