President Barack Obama has made immigration reform one of the major goals of his second term in the Presidency, and now, after much resistance for years by the majority of Republicans, suddenly we have a “Gang of Six” US Senators who are cooperatively working together toward that goal, making the likelihood of such reform much more likely.
The members of the “Gang of Six” are:
Democrats Charles Schumer of New York, Bob Menendez of New Jersey, and Dick Durbin of Illinois
Republicans Marco Rubio of Florida, John McCain of Arizona, and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina.
This group includes Senators from key states that have growing Latino population—New York, New Jersey, Illinois, Florida, Arizona and South Carolina.
it includes two leading Hispanic Senators, both Cuban—Menendez and Rubio.
It includes two Democratic leaders, the number 2 and number 3 in the leadership—Durbin and Schumer.
It includes former Republican Presidential candidate McCain, and his good friend, Graham.
If any combination of Democrats and Republicans can accomplish the goal of recognition of the need for a reasonable immigration reform, rather than the anti immigrant view of Mitt Romney during the Presidential campaign of 2012, it is this group of US Senators!
I would like to know, why is it that if you oppose people coming into this country illegally , that if you are against illegal immigration , you are accused of being anti-immigrant? The only reason I see is to avoid all debate by accusing the other guy of being mean. It is childish , but it works, that is the sad thing.
I remember back in 1986 they said ” We got to do this, and it will the only time” . Ted Kennedy on the Senate floor, “We are only giving citizenship to 1.5 million illegal immigrant. This will be a one time thing..” I could hear him know. And here we are, doing it again. Why would the result be any different?
Very good post Professor. Immigration has always been the life blood of our nation, from the Polish, Irish, and Italian immigrants who came in the late 1800s and early 1900s to the Latino immigrants of the past couple of decades.
The rhetoric is regrettable, but there has been a lot of statements that are very unacceptable about illegal immigrants, and I look at it as undocumented immigrants, not illegal. Our nation benefits from these immigrants, and only a small percentage of them create problems, and this is a land of opportunity. Ideally, everything is done in an orderly, legal manner, but we also know that much of what occurs does not follow that smoothly. We should promote a path to citizenship, as John McCain said today, as these people are an important part of American society, and should not face constant discrimination, and realistically, cannot be deported, and should not be, in any case.
As always the left trying to control the narrative by controlling the language. Now illegal is undocumented. That is technically incorrect. When you say undocumented you put forth the idea that the only thing these people are missing is a document, which they have a right to. But that is false, they do not have a right to any document, they entered the country in violation of the law, they entered illegally. The politicians and those who defend the illegal entry into the country make fun not only of the law, but of the millions of law abiding legal immigrants who have entered and who are waiting to enter the country legally in compliance with the law. But I know, that is so old fashion, the idea of respecting the law, the Constitution is such an antiquated idea for progressives. It has been so since the times of Woodrow Wilson.
Furthermore, do not we as a society discriminate between those that follow the law, and those that violate it? Is it all the same now? Then why prosecute tax cheats, thieves and other law breakers? Why should we differentiate them from others?
Do not compare immigrants who come here for a better life to thieves, tax cheats and serious criminals. Many of them go through “hell” in migrating here, something we are fortunate in not suffering personally. It is very harsh and mean spirited to compare them to common criminals who really harm America, when these people have contributed a lot to America and its economy, and just want a chance for the “American Dream”, and the nation benefits from them.
I am not comparing them,I am just taking the way of thinking of those who refuse to see that they (although very nice people or not, I don’t no every one of them,) have violated the law to its logical end. So if we do not distinguish those who violate the law from those who do not, then what is the purpose of having laws? Why is it so hard to see that these people have violated are laws and entered the country illegally?
I would wish for an ideal world, but we cannot deport eleven million people, and they can contribute to America, without having to live in fear and in the shadows. Life is not perfect, and no government is perfect, Juan!
Ronald, be careful you just repeated a conservative philosophical principle…life, government and thus man is not perfect! I will never understand why people would want to give so much power to the government knowing that it is not perfect and that men are the ones who hold such power.
Personally I would not deport them and I haven’t heard anyone support that idea. But I would not give them a path to citizenship, I would allow them to work, become resident and pay taxes. After of course a clean background check. But I would not allow them to become citizens unless they serve in the armed forces. Also I would make it clear that they violated the law, and would secure the border first. Finally all this law would come into effect once the border is secured and a balanced budget amendment is passed and becomes law.
So now we have a current immigration law, that the President decides to apply what he considers he should thus implementing the “Dream Act” by executive fiat. And we are suppose to believe that if we replace the current law with another law, somehow the President will apply it? How do we know he will not say, “No , I don’t consider this part is fair, I think it should be like this and that. Therefore in the name of public good I will use all the power within my office to do this and that”. We currently have no guarantee that the President will follow the law.
Actually, the DREAM Act includes attendance in college or military service. As far as a balanced budget amendment, what does that have to do with immigration? Absolutely nothing, so it sounds like you wish to “blackmail” supporters of immigration reform by adding an impossible requirement, which will never happen in any case, since there would have to be exceptions in time of war or depression, and therefore it is unworkable to have a balanced budget amendment.
The exceptions can be put into the amendment. It is workable, just limit spending to 18% of GDP and the deficit no more that 2% of GDP. War exception included of course.
But my worry is what guarantee do we , the American people have, that whatever law comes out of Congress will be enforced by President Obama. I mean he has decided not to enforce the current law, among other laws. There is no guarantee whatsoever with President Obama. This is what happens when we live in lawlessness.
I do not see the villain that you see in Barack Obama. Rather, I see the villain in George W. Bush, who abused his powers, was involved in illegal actions, and should have come up for impeachment, but the alternative of Dick Cheney was far worse. His administration was the most lawless since Richard Nixon, (see John Dean), without the positive changes that occurred under Nixon with all of his faults and abuses. Bush contributed nothing positive in his eight years, and all of his shortcomings now are blamed on Obama, who inherited the biggest mess since Franklin D. Roosevelt, after Herbert Hoover.
Hispanic vote in the last 32 yrs per Presidential election. I think this proves illegal immigration and amnesty are not why Hispanics overwhelmingly vote Democrat.
http://www.pewhispanic.org/files/2012/11/2012_Latino_vote_exit_poll_analysis_final_11-07-12.pdf
1980- During one of the worst economic times in recent history, double digit inflation, interest rates, unemployment, in essence “stagflation”, all a result of President Carter’s policies. Yet even then, Hispanics voted for the governing party, the Democrats by more than 21% difference.
Carter, 56%
Reagan, 35%
+21
1984- With the economy recovering and booming. With Reagan already, under pressure from the Republican establishment, talking about amnesty for illegal immigrants. Even though Reagan won in a landslide, even though he won in 49 states, Hispanics still voted more for Mondale! The same Mondale that 15 yrs earlier as Senator organized a march to the Mexican border protesting illegal immigration!!
Mondale, 61%
Reagan, 37%
+ 37%
1988 – After the economic boom of the Reagan years, after the passing of amnesty for over 3 million illegal immigrants under the Simpson-Mizzoli Act signed into law by President Reagan, one would think that Hispanics would start voting massively for Republicans. Yet again, they voted for Democrats and support for Republicans dropped 7%!!!! They voted for Dukakis who hadn’t even voted for any amnesty whatsoever!!
Dukakis, 69%
Bush, 30%
+39%
1992 – Again, support dropped even further for Republicans among Hispanics! Who did those 3 million illegal immigrants that received amnesty thanks to Republicans vote for? They voted Democrat and kicked Republicans in the rear!
Clinton, 61%
Bush, 35%
+ 36%
1996- Bob Dole another quintessential moderate establishment Republican, who belonged to the the establishment of the Republican party that promoted amnesty 10 years earlier was massively abandoned by Hispanics for Clinton who did not even address the issue!
Clinton, 72%
Dole, 21%
+ 51%!!!
2000- George Bush, Governor of Texas, with more ties to the Hispanic community through family and politics than Gore could ever dream of got destroyed by Gore! Hispanics still vote massively Democrat.
Gore, 62%
Bush, 35%
+ 27%
2004- Even after Bush promoted amnesty or pathway to citizenship, Kerry , a nobody when it comes to illegal immigration, Kerry who did not present during all his years in the Senate a single bill to help illegal immigrants, still got more votes among Hispanics than Bush!
Kerry, 58%
Bush, 40%
+18
2008-And here we come to McCain , a Senator who actually promoted a path to citizenship, a Senator who is a friend of the Hispanics, a Senator from Arizona, got smashed by an virtually unknown Senator from Chicago who had never ever even contemplated path to citizenship for illegal immigrants! Yet Hispanics voted massively for Democrats. One could say it was the crisis, but in 1980 we also had a terrible crisis and they still voted for the party that was governing and created the crisis back then, the Democrats!
Obama, 67%
McCain, 31%
+ 36%
2012- And we end with the latest moderate establishment imposed Republican candidate, having his clock cleaned by Obama. Also Hispanic unemployment rate went from 6.5% in 2008, 10% in 2009 to 11% in May 2012 and 13.3% for Hispanic youth in 2012! Yet Hispanic still voted for Democrats!
Obama, 71%
Romney, 27%
+44%
So this clearly demonstrates that amnesty is not why Hispanic vote Democrat, they vote Democrat because when you have massive illegal immigration of people who, no matter what the race or ethnicity, are unfortunately barely literate in their own language, who come here to work honestly and who as all love freedom , are easy pickings, just as they are in their home country (see Argentina, Venezuela, Ecuador) for demagogues like the Democrats who tell them that freedom also means unrestricted access to the welfare state, unrestricted access to tap the wealth of other people! That is what they vote for.
Conservatives/Republicans can turn blue in their face talking about the Constitution, limited government, fiscal deficits , massive debt, individual freedom and the giant overgrown authoritarian bureaucracy, but these people will not understand. What they do understand is the welfare check and government “help.” Specially when they are worried about putting food on the table. And not only illegal immigrants but even large part of the American citizens fall for the democrat party demagoguery!
One final thought, does anyone believe for one second , that if the Republicans had 70% of the Hispanic vote Obama and the Democrats would push for amnesty? Obama would be building a Berlin Wall type at the Southern border so fast it would be finished in 2 months!!
A primer on the DREAM Act: http://www.winningprogressive.org/a-primer-on-president-obamas-sensible-new-immigration-policy-to-protect-dreamers
Thanks for this primer from a great website! This gives the facts very clearly!
Is this the same Barack Hussein Obama who was one of the US Senators who derailed the work visas in the Kennedy-McCain bill?
Details about Obama’s immigration reform plan: http://www.winningprogressive.org/immigration-reform-plans-and-distinctions