| From: Roy Beck, President, NumbersUSA | |
| Date: Saturday 24FEB07 11:30 p.m. EST | |
CONSTANT ACTIVISM BEGINS AGAIN ON MONDAY.
You will soon be getting customized Alerts from us asking you to send specific faxes and make special phone calls to build resistance to the amnesty that Sen. Kennedy (D-MA) plans to announce on Wednesday.
Last year at this time, about 120,000 of you (we're double that size today) began a three-month constant battle to stop Congress from passing a massive amnesty for illegal aliens and the addition of 60 million foreign workers and dependents over the next two decades.
Last year, you won.
Kennedy and congressional Democratic leaders are saying they hope to try again, starting this coming week. They are counting on President Bush to round up enough Republicans to make up for all the Democrats you already are turning against the amnesty.
They say they will ram the amnesty through the Senate Judiciary Committee in March and pass it through the full Senate in April. Presumably the House would try to pass it in May.
We have a web page that already is tracking the Kennedy effort. Read more.
WHAT WE/YOU WILL HAVE TO DO
TO STOP THE AMNESTY AGAIN
Our top Senators of concern this week who need very specialized phone calls and faxes from you are these:
No. 1 -- Republican Senators who voted FOR the S. 2611 amnesty last May. Have to switch at least five of the 20.
No. 2 -- New Senators (both Democrats and Republicans). Need at least four of the seven.
No. 3 -- Democratic Senators who OPPOSED the S. 2611 amnesty last May. Need to keep all four.
No. 4 -- Democratic Senators who will face re-election in 2008. Need to pick up! two or three in case we fail to meet goal in the other categories.
No. 5 -- Republican Senators who OPPOSED the S. 2611 amnesty last May. Need to hold all 28.
From those groups, we have to persuade 41 to vote against "cloture" on the amnesty bill. ("Cloture" is the word for ending a filibuster and allowing a final vote on the bill. You can kill a bill with only 41 NO votes on cloture, out of the 100 Senators.)
Last year, the great activism of the half of you who were already on this team helped us get 36 NO votes -- five short of blocking the amnesty (thankfully, the Republican-controlled House refused to take up the bill).
RECRUITING THE MAGIC 41
I hope you will take a minute to look at this in a little more detail so you will understand how your work the next few months fits into the overall strategy to spare our nation from yet another immigration disaster.
Will you make a pact with me right now that you will stick with this battle until we have 41 NO votes to block the amnesty?
HOLD 28 REPUBLICANS: We start with the Republican Senators who OPPOSED the S. 2611 amnesty last May.
Of the 32 who voted NO last year, 28 are back. If you are in their states, you can leave them no doubt that their constituents overwhelmingly approved of what they did last year and would regard any support for the amnesty this year as a gigantic flip-flop.
Several of these have significant weaknesses on immigration issues and might have voted last year with the Kennedy/McCain/Bush amnesty team if not for your pressure.
*****I have put asterisks by Senators who may need some extra push to stay in the anti-amnesty camp, especially if there are some compromises and Pres. Bush makes an all-out effort to push the amnesty.
*****Alexander (R-TN)
*****Allard (R-CO)
*****Bond (R-MO)
Bunning (R-KY)
Burr (R-NC)
Chambliss (R-GA)
Coburn (R-OK)
*****Cochran (R-MS)
Cornyn (R-TX)
Crapo (R-ID)
DeMint (R-SC)
Dole (R-NC)
Ensign (R-NV)
Enzi (R-WY)
Grassley (R-IA)
*****Hatch (R-UT)
*****Hutchison (R-TX)
Inhofe (R-OK)
Isakson (R-GA)
Kyl (R-AZ)
*****Lott (R-MS)
Roberts (R-KS)
Sessions (R-AL)
Shelby (R-AL)
*****Sununu (R-NH)
Thomas (R-WY)
Thune (R-SD)
Vitter (R-LA)
HOLD 4 DEMOCRATS: These four courageously opposed most of th! eir Part y last year.
It will be even more difficult for them to stand against their Party this year because the Democratic leaders are in control now and can withhold perks if these four threaten to be the key votes that would block the Democratic leaders' open borders agenda. They need a ton of praise and appreciation.
Byrd (D-WV)
Dorgan (D-ND)
Nelson (D-NE)
******Stabenow (D-MI)
Stabenow was a surprise last year. Most considered her vote in May a sign that she felt she was facing a potentially tough re-election bid to a second term. Now that she has won easily, will she turn her back on the workers of Michigan and side with the wage-lowering business lobbyists in order to satisfy her Party leaders?
RECRUIT 4 OF THE 7 NEW SENATORS: These seven replaced four Senators who voted NO on amnesty last year.
*****Brown (D-OH)
*****Casey (D-PA)
Corker (R-TN)
McCaskill (D-MO)
Tester (D-MT)
Webb (D-VA)
*****Whitehouse (D-RI)
Corker, McCaskill, Tester and Webb all ran as hard-liners against illegal immigration, but there are reasons for doubt with each of them as to their true commitment, especially with the freshmen Democrats who may feel a need to stay in good graces with their Party's leadership.
Don't let them ever forget for a moment that the public remembers their campaign rhetoric from last fall.
And I wouldn't let Casey and Brown off the hook. They are in strongly competitive states. Voting for this Kennedy amnesty could lose them major blue-collar worker support that they might never win back.
If you meet all three of those goals, you have produced 36 NO votes, the same as last year. Now, how to get the last five votes?
SWITCH 5 PRO-AMNESTY REPUBLICANS
There were 23 last year, and 20 of them returned this year.
I know that you in their states have given them a really tough time since last May. Can you move at least five of these?
Bennett (R-UT)
Brownback (R-KS)
Coleman (R-MN)
Collins (R-ME)
Craig (R-ID)
Domenici (R-NM)
Graham (R-SC)
Gregg (R-NH)
Hagel (R-NE)
Lugar (R-IN)
Martinez (R-FL)
McCain (R-AZ)
McConnell (R-KY)
Murkowski (R-AK)
Smith (R-OR)
Snowe (R-ME)
Specter (R-PA)
Stevens (R-AK)
Voinovich (R-OH)
Warner (R-VA)
If you are in any of these states, you have a huge responsibility immediately.
We are in a game of psychological chicken here. The Democrats are taunting Pres. Bush to use the full arm-twisting power of the White House to hold these 20 and ensure an amnesty passes. They and their open-borders allies -- Chamber of Commerce, Catholic bishops, ACLU, most newspaper editorial boards, national origins identity groups and unions -- are calling Bush a wimp for urging amnesties in his speeches but never delivering his Party's support in Congress.
It is imperative that Pres. Bush not be goaded into making this the White House fight of the year.
A key way to do that is for you to create so much angst in the offices of these 20 Republican Senators that they send strong signals to the White House that they want it to stay out of the fight.
For this to work, you have to act immediately and regularly.
One reason some of these Republicans may switch is that it looks like Kennedy may deliver a bill that is even worse than last year's. That will give them an excuse to switch and perhaps save face with their big business donors.
Another reason for hope is that several of these Republicans may not be ideologically committed to open borders and wage depression. Rather, their pro-amnesty vote may have been mainly a loyalty vote at the reque! st of la st year's Party leadership of Pres. Bush, Senate Majority Leader Frist (R-TN) and the No. 2 Senate leader McConnell (R-KY).
But Frist is gone. McConnell is the head Republican now. With McConnell not having control of the Senate or responsibility for it, he could be persuaded that there is no reason to help Kennedy and the Democrats win a big victory. At the very least, McConnell may not push other Republicans to follow Kennedy and Bush, releasing them to go with where their constituents are most pressuring, perhaps.
In addition, Sen. Lott (R-MS) is now the No. 2 GOP leader. He voted NO on amnesty last year and may help tip the balance within leadership circles. Last year saw the strange circumstance of the Senate GOP leaders pushing for an amnesty that the majority of their Party's Senators opposed.
There are a lot of reasons for the GOP leadership this year to line up with where the majority of their Party's Senators are -- especially with your constant response to our Action Alerts to put pressure on them.
FOR INSURANCE, SWITCH 4 PRO-AMNESTY DEMOCRATS
The four goals above would add up to the Magic 41.
But that's too close, when our nation's future is at stake, don't you think? We could easily miss the goal in one or two of those above four categories. So, those of you with Democratic Senators who voted for the amnesty last year need to make life miserable for them the next month, even if you don't think there is any chance they could switch.
About a dozen of them will be facing re-election bids next year. We will be sending special opportunities to those of you in their states as some of them will need to think twice before voting again for a giant amnesty.
Here are the Democrats who voted for last year's amnesty:
Akaka (D-HI)
Baucus (D-MT)
Bayh (D-IN)
Biden (D-DE)
Bingaman (D-NM)
Boxer (D-CA)
Cantwell (D-! WA)
Carper (D-DE)
Clinton (D-NY)
Conrad (D-ND)
Dayton (D-MN)
Dodd (D-CT)
Durbin (D-IL)
Feingold (D-WI)
Feinstein (D-CA)
Harkin (D-IA)
Inouye (D-HI)
Johnson (D-SD)
Kennedy (D-MA)
Kerry (D-MA)
Kohl (D-WI)
Landrieu (D-LA)
Lautenberg (D-NJ)
Leahy (D-VT)
Levin (D-MI)
Lieberman (D-CT)
Lincoln (D-AR)
Menendez (D-NJ)
Mikulski (D-MD)
Murray (D-WA)
Nelson (D-FL)
Obama (D-IL)
Pryor (D-AR)
Reed (D-RI)
Reid (D-NV)
Sarbanes (D-MD)
Schumer (D-NY)
Wyden (D-OR)
YOU MAY HAVE TO PICK UP A PHONE THIS TIME
I know most of you prefer to do the easier action -- clicking to send faxes.
That's good.
But we also need a lot more phone calls which tend to have several times the impact of faxes -- especially in conjunction with the faxes.
When you get alerts asking for phone calls, please look them over carefully and at least try making one. Most people are surprised at how easy it is. Once you have done it, you will tend to feel quite empowered.
Last year, the open-borders groups complained after they lost that our side had out-phoned and out-faxed them by as much as 100-1. They have spent the last year trying to build up the tools and troops to at least match you.
Fortunately, NumbersUSA's membership development team has not taken a break since last May and has more than doubled our membership. But we are going to need every one of you.
THANKS FOR BEING PART OF THIS FIGHT,
-- ROY