Byron York: The facts on Rubio, Cruz, and immigration

The Gang of Eight comprehensive immigration reform bill passed the Senate after a series of votes in June 2013. Democrats, who controlled the Senate at the time, unanimously supported the bill, while most Republicans opposed it. The four Republicans on the gang - Marco Rubio, John McCain, Lindsey Graham, and Jeff Flake - of course voted for it, and also agreed with Democrats on a plan to kill almost all GOP amendments.

Then-Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid allowed just a handful of amendments to reach the Senate floor. One, from Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley, would have prohibited the legalization of illegal immigrants in the United States until after the administration could prove it had maintained "effective control" of the borders for six months.

Another Republican amendment, from Sen. John Thune, would have required the completion of 350 miles of fencing along the U.S. border that Congress had ordered in 1996 but had never been completed. Thune specified that the fencing had to be in place before legalization could commence. Thune also would have required the completion of 700 miles of such fencing before illegal immigrants' legal status could be made permanent.

The other substantive GOP amendment allowed by Reid was from Sen. David Vitter. It would have delayed the granting of legal status until a biometric visa identity system first ordered by Congress in 1996 had been "fully implemented at every land, sea, and airport of entry" into the United States.

Earlier, Republicans offered dozens of amendments to the Gang of Eight bill when it was making its way through the Senate Judiciary Committee. Under a pre-arranged plan, the gang, including Rubio, agreed to kill any amendments they felt would threaten their legislation.

"The eight met in private before each committee hearing, hashing out which amendments they would support and which oppose as a united coalition," the Washington Post reported in May 2013. "Senate aides said amendments were rejected if either side felt they would shatter the deal."

For example, the Post reported, "GOP members of the group opposed several tough border-control amendments from Sen. Ted Cruz."

The public discovered the secret Rubio-Democratic agreement when the Judiciary Committee was considering an amendment that involved giving government payments to former illegal immigrants through the Earned Income Tax Credit program. Sen. Chuck Schumer, the leading Democrat on the Gang of Eight, was caught on an open microphone turning to an aide and saying, "Do our Republicans have a pass on this one, if they want?" It turned out they did, meaning Schumer would allow gang Republicans to vote against the measure.

Rubio was not on the Judiciary Committee, so he did not vote on the committee amendments. But he was part of the gang agreement to kill GOP amendments, several of which were from Cruz, who was on the committee.

The Gang of Eight bill came up for a final Senate vote on June 27, 2013. Rubio, as a key author of the legislation, voted for its passage. Cruz voted against it.

It's worth going through history because Rubio, now locked in a presidential primary race against Cruz, has argued that his position on immigration is similar to Cruz's.

"The bottom line is there isn't that big a difference between [Cruz] and I on how to approach immigration," Rubio told CBS News on Sunday.

Certainly in 2013, Rubio and Cruz could hardly have been more different in how they approached immigration. Rubio has since distanced himself from the gang bill, his signature achievement in his nearly five years in the Senate, saying that immigration reform cannot be accomplished by one giant bill and instead should be enacted piecemeal. Rubio also says - reminiscent of the Grassley amendment he helped kill - that security and enforcement must be in place before illegal immigrants can be legalized and placed on a path to citizenship.

It remains unclear where Rubio stands on the thousands of other provisions in his 1,197-page Gang of Eight bill. In five Republican presidential debates, he has been asked exactly one question about the substance of the bill. (The question was whether Rubio still supports a path to citizenship; he does, while Cruz doesn't.)

There's a chance Rubio will be asked more questions about the specifics of the gang bill in the weeks before Republicans begin voting in primaries and caucuses. It's not clear what he will say, although after the recent Las Vegas debate, a spokesman offered a preview of Rubio's answer.

"The provisions in the 2013 bill were the product of compromise and not what we would have done if we'd written the bill on our own," Rubio aide Alex Conant said. If a President Rubio undertook immigration reform, Conant added, the results "would not be the same as what the Senate passed in 2013."

That reasoning gives Rubio a rationale to abandon any part of the Gang of Eight that he chooses. But what happened in 2013 still matters. For one thing, it's not that long ago. And for another, Rubio himself believes the past is important. "If you're going to attack someone on a policy issue," Rubio said on CBS Sunday, "you need to be clear about where you stand on the issue and where you've stood in the past."

Certainly in 2013, Rubio and Cruz could hardly have been more different in how they approached immigration.

Different, but not different on the question of legalization in and of itself. Cruz supported it so long as the border was secured as a prerequisite:

"And Iâ€™d like to make a final point to those advocacy groups that are very engaged in this issue and rightly concerned about addressing our immigration system, and in particular about addressing the situation for the 11 million who are currently in the shadows. If this amendment is adopted to the current bill the effect would be that those 11 million under this current bill would still be eligible for RPI status.** They would still be eligible for legal status and indeed under the terms of the bill they would be eligible for LPR status as well, so that they are out of the shadows, which the proponents of this bill repeatedly point to as their principle objective â€” to provide a legal status for those who are here illlegally to be out of the shadows. This amendment would allow that to happen

And a second point to those advocacy groups that are so passionately engaged. In my view if this committee rejects this amendment, and I think everyone here views it as quite likely this committee will choose to reject this amendment, in my view that decision will make it much, much more likely that this entire bill will fail in the House of Representantives. I donâ€™t want immigration reform to fail. I want immigration reform to pass, and so I would urge people of good faith on both sides of the aisle, if the objective is to pass common sense immigration reform that secures the borders, that improves legal immigration, and that allows those who are here illegally to come in out of the shadows, then we should look for areas of bipartisan agreement and compromise to come together and this amendment â€” I believe if this amendment were to pass the chances of this bill passing into law would increase dramatically, and so I would urge the committee to give it full consideration and to adopt the amendment"

http://www.kausfiles.com/2015/05/21/cruz-and-amnesty-round-ii-the-telltale-video/

What's interesting about all the supposed "histories" on the subject, none really tackle the essential fact that deportation-- not even on Rush's program-- was a mainstream position. No one in the GOP-- at least at this time-- ever supported a position of deporting all illegal aliens. Not Jeff Sessions, not Mike Lee, not Ted Cruz, not even Rush Limbaugh. It simply was not a topic of conversation:

See here

Rubio is DANGEROUS! Better find out who owns Marco! He is a Trojan Horse! BTW...Cesar Conda is Ryan’s mentor and owns him too!

THE RUBIO DECEPTION
https://klsouth.wordpress.com/2014/07/19/refresher-rubios-deceptions/

[snip]To understand Rubio, you have to understand his Chief of Staff; a man by the name of Cesar Conda. Who is Cesar Conda? He’s a pro-amnesty immigration lawyer, who once worked as a DC lobbyist for the Association of Immigration Lawyers [video], mutual friend and close associate of fellow amnesty pusher Grover Norquist, who together have carried out their three-decade long Amnesty Jihad. Like Norquist, the amnesty pushers on the left like Cesar Conda.

Norquist, a corporate lobbyist and co-founder of the Islamic Institute, has had ties to CAIR, radical Islam, known terrorist financiers and unsavory relationships with Muslim activist for years. This video warrants particular scrutiny of Norquist, who actively promotes and advances the Islamic agenda. These are Norquist’s bedfellows; it’s why he actively petitioned support for the “Ground Zero Mosque” and it’s why he is very active in “Muslim outreach.”

Norquist is on the Advisory Board of The Hispanic Leadership Fund, member of the Council on Foreign Relations [CFR], Founder of Americans for Tax Reform [ATR] and good pal of felon Jack Abramoff and GOP stooge Karl Rove whose Crossroads GPS group has been a major donor to Norquist’s fund. Secret emails exclusively obtained by Breitbart News show the libertarian Cato Institute, Norquist’s ATR, and Rubio colluding on immigration reform “messaging” after the Boston Marathon bombing.

And, then there is Norquist’s lobbying on behalf of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Norquist’s primary interest in DC is Norquist. For his part, he is hitting the media trail attempting to combat what he calls the “bitter enders” who oppose the bill by trying to counteract the effect of “a handful of radio talk-show hosts who talk loudly.” Also assisting Rubio, Conda and Norquist in their Amnesty scheme is the Southern Poverty Law Center [SPLC], a Soros-backed group. SPLC’s history.

Cesar Conda sat on the Editorial Advisory Board with George Soros of the publication, The International Economy Magazine. He also actively worked to promote and advance Judge Sotomayor’s nomination. Conda was a lobbyist for the powerhouse private prisons GEO Group who supported open borders and government money for incarcerated illegal aliens. He also lobbied for the US Chamber of Commerce, who supports the Gang of Eight Amnesty bill. His paw prints also extend to the expensive bank bailouts, something Rubio claims he was against.

Conda is a domestic policy wonk. His government experience runs deep. In fact, Conda has weaved and bobbed between so many roles in Washington he was included in Roll Call’s “Fabulous Fifty” list of top congressional aides. He undertook policy roles spanning the 1996 Dole-Kemp to Mitt Romney’s 2008 Presidential Campaigns. Both Conda and Norquist worked together to destroy prop 187 in California in the 1990’s.

But, what also sets Rubio’s office apart is Cesar Conda’s supposed continued ties, major abuse of power, and financial relationship with his lobbying firm, Navigators Global. Navigators clients included GlaxoSmithKline, AT&T, Visa and Citigroup, which got $45 billion under the bank bailout. Rubio’s ties to K-Street are extensive. His deputy chief of staff, Sally Canfield, is a former lobbyist for Sanofi-Aventis, a French drug company.

And, from 1997 to 2005 Rubio himself, was a lobbyist. Consider what one of his most vocal critics said about him here, which likely put a halt to Romney selecting Rubio as VP candidate. Consider: City commissioner, lawyer, lobbyist, one-time GOP Party of Florida American Express card holder, top-echelon House leader and, ultimately, House Speaker, oh and Jeb Bush water boy. Florida is a politically corrupt state. From 2000 to 2010, there were 781 federal convictions on corruption charges. That’s an average of one every five days for 10 straight years.

Like Conda, Rubio has amnesty as a core belief. He is John McCain with an ‘accent’; and without a military record of crashing planes. His past record is relevant. All you have to do is look at history. This page provides history of the efforts of Floridians to enact immigration enforcement legislation in the 2008 Florida Legislative Session. All legislative results were thwarted, at the time, by House Speaker Marco Rubio.

Rubio stalled and “blocked” all enforcement bills in Florida stating: “There is nothing the state of Florida can do unilaterally to solve global warming. And there is nothing we can do unilaterally to solve immigration.” Rep. Juan Zapata, R-Miami and Miami Rep. David Rivera, the son of Cuban exiles, usually ran anti-enforcement interference for Rubio in the Florida House.

But there were other legislative matters. Rubio pushed for free in-state tuition for illegal aliens on Florida taxpayers dime. He fought to allow a “self pay” (no insurance) for medical care without the hospital collecting a balance on the hospital billing; while prohibiting the hospital from pursuing civil remedies. This would serve illegal aliens by protecting them from detection. And he made an attempt to keep all “working papers” (such as dead bills) from seeing light of day...

“It figures the SPLC would be in on this. What a nasty bunch of bedfellows for Rubio to take up with.”

More on that...they even provided Rubio/Norquist/Conda with SPLC talking points to try to denigrate anyone going against the gang of eight.

http://towncriernews.blogspot.com/2013/03/conservativestea-partyclean-out-your.html

[snip]An article from the Washington Post in February outlines how lobbyists like Grover Norquist, and political want to be’s like Marco Rubio, included in McCain’s gang of eight, are undermining decent organizations who actually have our best interests in mind.

The following articles give insight into big amnesty boss Grover Norquist, but also Marco Rubio, who according to the article, refused to allow what he called anti immigrant groups such as Numbers USA, the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), and the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) a voice in the discussion.

Rubio & Norquist are both aligned with the lying, treacherous SPLC on this one and are using SPLC material and propaganda to silence them!

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