Posted on 11/20/2006 7:08:25 AM PST by Dane
Immigration wasn’t a winning platform
The Issue: Illegal immigration proves to be less of an issue for the American public than many in Congress had thought.
Our Opinion: It is time for Congress to devise a reasonable immigration-reform measure that meets the need for a more secure border and recognizes the importance of foreign nationals to our econ-omy.
In a campaign miscalculation that proved fatal to several candi-dates, incumbents and challengers — most of them Republicans — found that the illegal-immigration issue wasn’t nearly as important to the American public as they had thought.
Actually, illegal immigration trailed several issues in importance, according to voters interviewed in exit polls.
Top priority was official corruption, according to 42 percent of the voters interviewed during exit polls, followed by terrorism (40 percent), the economy (39 percent), Iraq (37 percent) and values (36 percent).
Only 29 percent of the voters who talked to exit pollsters said illegal immigration was extremely important to them.
According to Republican pollster Ed Goeas and Democratic pollster Doug Schoen, only 8 percent of voters ranked illegal immigration as their top issue.
As a result, many candidates who had hoped that a tough stance on illegal immigration would overcome their constituents’ dissatisfaction with Iraq found themselves making concession speeches on election night.
Most notable was GOP Indiana Rep. John Hostettler, chairman of the House Immigration Subcommittee, who lost to his Democratic opponent, Brad Ellsworth, by a wide margin.
Hostettler was the prime mover of a heavily punitive illegal-immigration bill passed by the House late last year.
Included in the bill was a provision that would have made felons of the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants living in the country. The provision was eliminated from the House bill during a House/Senate conference committee.
Hostettler also took part in what were termed field hearings across the country to stir up voters on the issue.
The Indiana Republican was not the only illegal-immigration hardliner to be rebuked by voters. In Arizona, through which thousands of illegal immigrates enter the United States each year, GOP Rep. John D. Hayworth lost his bid for a seventh terms in Congress.
He is the author of a book titled “Whatever It Takes: Illegal Immi-gration, Border Security and the War on Terror.”
A political opportunist, Hayworth supported President Bush’s guest-worker plan then turned against it when it appeared that an anti-illegal immigration stance would be more acceptable to his constituents.
All of this is a strong indicator that the American public probably is amenable to an immigration-reform bill that would incorporate a program that would provide a path for illegal immigrants eventually to attain U.S. citizenship.
Perhaps it’s time to revive Bush’s plan, which would allowed ille-gal immigrants to obtain three-year work visas. After the visas expire, the illegal immigrants would be required to return to their countries of origin and go through legal channels if they wanted to return.
Or maybe the plan devised by the Senate Judiciary Committee could be reconsidered. That plan would balance enforcement of immigration laws with a recognition of the role foreign nationals play in our economy.
And of course there’s the plan co-sponsored by Sens. John McCain, an Arizona Republican, and Edward M. Kennedy, a Massachusetts Democrat. Their plan would beef up border security and require illegal immigrants to pay all fees required of legal immi-grants as well as a $1,000 fine before they could become guest workers.
None of these plans amount to amnesty. They do secure the boarder while allowing foreign nationals to work in the United States.
Where's the barf alert?
It's full of illegals. And is one of the most violent cities in the country.
Oh, and why are you bashing Tancredo? After all, he has an ACU rating of 100, and you said we couldn't bash Martinez when he had the same rating.
How many candidates in favor of shamnesty or a guest-worker program lost? One can always attempt to discern trends by cherry-picking the data.
More viloent than Detorit, and Reading is in the middle of Amish country, please, your replies are getting ridiculous.
DeWine and Chafee lost to even bigger pro-amnesty liberal democrats.
"The Issue: Illegal immigration proves to be less of an issue for the American public than many in Congress had thought."
The problem was many of the solutions smacked of racist, illegal immigration. Where is the big push for a fence up north?
No doubt that this is more of an issue for the southern border states whose hospitals and social services are being driven into the ground.
Here is the two, million dollar questions that has to be answered:
1) Are we willing to commit to a huge, continental fence, (not some 700 mile, unfunded fence)? Would the Right accept a tax increase to pay for it? Or would it need to come from the defense budget, or run up the deficit more?
2) Do we expect that, some how, resources will be found to ship all illegals down south to avoid the amnesty charge?
Yawn.
No, it's not Dane. You're thinking of Lancaster. Reading is sliding downhill in a hurry because of a massive influx of illegals over the last decade. It was ahead of Philly in the most recent violence ranking.
Plenty of other pubbies lost who were in favor of shamnesty or guest worker programs. I'm just pointing out how nonsensical it is to look at two races as proof of a point - especially when Hayworth was tainted by the Abramoff scandal (a little detail you keep attempting to brush aside).
God Bless you Dane for keeping to post this articles. People have to listen on this issue big time.
Americans want some compromise on this issue. They want real border security, and they want illegal immigration to end. However, they are not too thrilled with a blanet Deprt them all big or small or starve them over the border approach either.
THe question will be this. If Comprehensive immigration reform passess what next. Shall we keep running people on the "You might become a citizen but I will never view you as legit" platform. During the past year certain Republicans bottled up the bill in Congress. THey had silly political like hearings whose purpose was to grandstand that solve. If we were smart we would pass a bill this Congress. However I think people will not be smart and they will be on the outside looking in next session.
Better to ride the Dane train to Alta Mexico, formerly the USA....
If his position on illegal immigration is such a loser, why did he win re-election?
2) Do you expect that, somehow resources will be found to supply all illegals with all the hospitals, education, training, and insurance they need?
There are no easy answers, but we cannot pretend all the expense is on one side.
Immigration wasn’t a winning platform
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While, J.D. Hayworth and Randy Graf lost, 1 out of 3 is good in baseball, very poor in politics.
Yes it was .. because every democrat who won WAS STRONG ON IMMIGRATION. Immigration was a winning platform .. but too many of our RINO's were not willing to get onboard.
As their vote in the 110th Congress is for nancy pelosi as Speaker.
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