Immigration -- The Right's Internal Battle

July 16, 2009

by Faiz Shakir, Amanda Terkel, Matt Corley, Benjamin Armbruster, Ryan Powers, Nate Carlile, and Andrea Nill

IMMIGRATION

The Right's Internal Battle

This past week, former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice stressed the need for conservatives to embrace a "welcoming" attitude towards immigrants. Puerto Rican Governor Luis Fortuño, considered to be "one of the most prominent Hispanic Republicans," called on the GOP to rethink its hard-line positions on immigration. These recent comments add to the laundry list of Republican leaders and strategists who have indicated that the party must clean up its views and rhetoric if it hopes to endure. That's because Latinos and immigrants make up a growing voting bloc that has largely abandoned the Republican Party and "flipped red states to blue." The reason for their defection: Right-wing anti-immigrant demagoguery tarnished the Republican brand during the 2007 immigration debate. The GOP is viewed as having created a climate of undeterred public immigrant-bashing that brought nativism into the mainstream. As a result, anti-Latino hate crimes increased, racial profiling soared, and in Nov. 2008, Latino and immigrant voters turned out in favor of Democrats in hopes of seeing major improvements in their communities. Census estimates indicate that Latinos will make up one quarter of the U.S. population by 2042. Much of the political success of the current Congress and administration hinges on its ability to deliver comprehensive immigration reform.

LESSONS LEARNED: Several members of the GOP leadership came out of last year's elections saying the GOP seriously needs to "change its tune" on immigration. Last weekend, Rice told a Sacramento, CA audience, "We've got to keep welcoming these people [immigrants]." A few months ago, she indicated that not passing comprehensive immigration reform that would have legalized millions of undocumented immigrants in 2007 was her "deepest regret." Rice's comments are backed by her former colleagues Karl Rove and Colin Powell, who pointed out that the "policies with which we greet them [immigrants] are, in important ways, self-fulfilling." Former Republican National Committee (RNC) Chair Jim Nicholson also urged Republicans to "review" their position on immigration. Sen. Mel Martinez (R-FL), who many speculate as having resigned from his post as RNC Chairman due to his party's immigration stance, warned that the GOP will be "relegated to minority status" if it continues its anti-Latino rhetoric.

LOOKING TOWARDS 2012: Some Republican leaders who are eying the 2012 elections are taking his advice. Rumored presidential hopeful former Florida governor Jeb Bush recently told Esquire magazine that Republicans need to establish a "new tone" on immigration that doesn't pit Latinos and immigrants against the GOP. Along those lines, Bush co-chaired a report released last week by the Council on Foreign Relations that recommends implementing comprehensive immigration reform consistent with American values and includes an "earned" path to legalization. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, another rumored presidential hopeful who once bitterly slammed bilingual education, appeared on Univision's "Al Punto" with Jorge Ramos and has started a Spanish website and twitter feed. Another likely 2012 GOP contender, Mitt Romney -- who took a strong anti-immigrant stance in the Republican primaries -- is still advising his party to stick to its immigration principles. However, he has conceded that those principles need to be communicated in a "more effective way" because Republicans actually "celebrate immigrants." In April, he said "one way to attract more minorities to the GOP is to pass immigration reform before the next election." Though mostly mum on the subject, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R) once cited the "Hispanic vote" as one of the main reasons she and John McCain were defeated in last year's presidential election.

OLD HABITS DIE HARD: Republicans are still finding their "way out of the wilderness" when it comes to immigration. Despite adopting a friendlier approach, Gingrich is proposing a program that would involve sending all 12 million undocumented workers back to their home countries in exchange for a temporary guest-worker visa. GOP strategists were appalled at the attacks from Gingrich and others against Judge Sonia Sotomayor. Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) led the assault throughout this week's nomination hearings and this week, MSNBC right-wing pundit Pat Buchanan essentially told the GOP to forget Latino voters and attack Sotomayor's discrimination against white males. Last week, Republican lawmakers were also busy playing a huge role in passing a series of enforcement-only immigration amendments proposed by Senators Jim DeMint (R-SC), David Vitter (R-LA), Jeff Sessions (R-AL), and Chuck Grassley (R-IA) that had anti-immigrant groups celebrating. Meanwhile, the July 4th tea parties charted a course for the Republican Party that further cemented anti-immigrant sentiments within the GOP's base: White supremacists eagerly recruited new members and right-wing celebrity "Joe the Plumber" punctuated the event, saying immigrants should get the "hell out of our damn country."

RADICAL RIGHT -- SALAZAR DECRIES McCAIN'S OBSTRUCTION OF TOP INTERIOR DEPARTMENT OFFICIALS: Following a Senate hearing on Tuesday, Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar explained to reporters that his department "can't go about doing our job" because Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) is preventing the confirmation of his top land staff. "We don't have the capacity at this point in time, frankly, to provide those answers, because I don't have the leadership yet," said Salazar. "We frankly can't go about doing our job if we don't have our people in place." Senate rules allow a single Senator to anonymously block the confirmation of presidential appointments, no matter the reason. McCain is blocking Bob Abbey, nominated for the position of Bureau of Land Management administrator, and Wilma Lewis, the nominee for Interior's assistant secretary for land and minerals, "until the Obama administration takes a position on his legislation to clear a path for a copper mine in Arizona's Tonto National Forest." Unfortunately, McCain is not the only senator to abuse his privilege by holding nominees in order to extract concessions from the Obama administration. Sen. George Voinovich (R-OH) has placed a hold on Robert Perciasepe, nominated to be the Environmental Protection Agency's second in command, because "he is dissatisfied" with an EPA finding that clean energy legislation would only cost American households a postage stamp a day. And Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-GA) has placed a hold on Cass Sunstein, nominated to be the director of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, over the agriculture industry's concerns dealing with his opinions on animal welfare. While conservatives block key appointees, they're also railing against the Obama administration for trying to staff up with appointees that don't require Senate confirmation. The right wing has referred to these appointees as "czars" who are part of a "socialist plot" and a "giant expansion of presidential power."

In the Wall Street Journal today, Karl Rove "continues to argue that only Republicans can get us out of the economic mess that they created." Offering advice to Obama, Rove suggests more tax cuts: "House Republicans offered an alternative recovery package of immediate tax cuts and safety-net measures that cost half as much as Mr. Obama's stimulus program."

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton took center stage on Wednesday, delivering what the State Department billed as a major foreign policy address. The Obama administration, Clinton said, "is attempting to build a 'multi-partner world' in which governments and private groups work collectively on common global problems and in which the United States does not shun dialogue with its adversaries."

Politico notes that, after American International Group paid out $165 million in bonuses to top executives in March, Congress exploded in a political orgy of outrage. "But when the news broke late last week about a second, $235 million round of AIG bonuses, the halls of Congress resounded largely with, well, silence."

Rep. Mike Ross (D-AR), a leader of the conservative "Blue Dog" Democrats, told CNN yesterday that "he and other group members may vote to block House Democrats' health care bill from passing a key committee if they don't get some of the changes they want." "We remain opposed to the current bill, and we continue to meet several times a day to decide how we're going to proceed," said Ross.

In a speech today at a U.S. Steel Corp. plant near Pittsburgh, U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk is expected to say that "the Obama administration is 'going to bat for American industrial workers' through greater protection of labor rights and more aggressive monitoring of overseas trade practices."

Judge Sonia Sotomayor's responses yesterday in Senate testimony were "music to [the] ears" of business lawyers. "In business, the predictability of law may be the most necessary," Sotomayor said. "Business lawyers said the comments signaled an appreciation of the practical needs of companies."

Prisoners at Bagram prison -- the largest U.S. detention facility in Afghanistan -- "have refused to leave their cells for at least the past two weeks to protest their indefinite imprisonment." News of the prison-wide protest "came to light when the International Committee of the Red Cross informed the families of several detainees that scheduled video teleconferences and family visits were being canceled."

President Obama's political operation, Organizing for America, began running ads yesterday "targeting fellow Democrats and centrist Republicans urging them to support the president's call for health care reform this year." The 30-second TV commercial, which will run in eight states and on national cable television, "does not mention the senators by name, but it does ask viewers to call Capitol Hill."

And finally: During his questioning of Sotomayor yesterday, Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) quizzed her about her interest in the classic TV show Perry Mason. "It amazes me that you wanted to become a prosecutor based on the show, because in 'Perry Mason' the prosecutor on that show lost every week," Franken said. Except one case, Sotomayor responded. Lightening the mood, Franken used his final question to ask which episode that was. Sotomayor confessed she had no idea. "Didn't the White House prepare you?" Franken asked.

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Pat Buchanan's advice for the GOP on Sotomayor: Don't be afraid of "Hispanic hostility for a generation" and embrace race baiting.

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"Blue Dog" congressional districts have more uninsured than the average congressional district and need health care reform the most.

Is Harry Reid's support for a "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" repeal an important bellwether of changing political views?

Meghan McCain says that "Joe the Plumber...is a dumbass" and "should stick to plumbing."

Sarah Palin is a prolific fundraiser -- for the left.

"There is no dispute that appeals courts interpret laws and regulations, sometimes throwing them out entirely. The difference is that conservative judges avoid the 'making policy' shorthand."
-- AP, 9/14/09

VERSUS

"In fact, however, the judges of inferior courts often 'make law,' since the precedent of the highest court does not cover every situation, and not every case is reviewed."
-- Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, 06/27/02

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