A front-page piece in today’s WaPo reports:
Polls may not suggest it, and the candidates may not be catering to it, but immigration is an issue that voters won’t let the GOP White House hopefuls escape.
Republican primary voters keep bringing immigration up as the candidates campaign in back yards, opera houses and recreation halls across Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina. To a sizable chunk of those who will pick the GOP’s presidential nominee, immigration is an urgent issue, even a litmus test.
Here’s the main takeaway of the article:
“Immigration is not even close to the top issue for most Republicans today, but it is an issue that is heavy with symbolic importance to Republican voters,” said GOP pollster Jon Lerner, who advised Tim Pawlenty until he dropped out of the race last month. “If a candidate is squishy on immigration, that symbolically suggests that he’s probably unreliable on a whole host of other conservative issues.”
The gap between voters and elites is large on immigration, perhaps larger than on any other issue (for more on this, see here, here, here, here, and here). So a candidate’s immigration statements become a populist diagnostic tool, serving as a way to determine whether a candidate is one of Them (the elite) or one of Us (the people). And certain words and phrases are flashing lights that you’re one of Them: “comprehensive,” “undocumented,” “jobs Americans won’t do,” “virtual fence,” “we can’t deport 11 million people,” and so on.
This isn’t true only on the right, but also among independents and Reagan Democrats (remember Hillary’s seemingly hawkish immigration comments early in her campaign?). But obviously the right is where this will matter most over the next year, presenting maybe the greatest threat to Perry, since his squishiness on immigration is so much in contrast with his swaggering persona.
I love that a guy who writes for one of the most influential publications in Washington can somehow consider himself not part of the "elite".
Self-perception is so flexible!
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAs romneycare is romney's achilles heel, immigration policy is Perry's. because i feel so strongly about this issue, i'm going with romney.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAbsolutely.
A healthcare bill can be repealed (case in point: ObamaCare, which I'm convinced we'll get repealed).
It's much tougher to undo the damage when your hometown, or entire country, becomes Tijuana. Illegal immigration really is the most pressing issue -- there is nothing else that will have so great an influence on what this country will fundamentally be -- Latin America, or the West? -- in the future.
To my mind, now is precisely NOT the time to have a presidential race between Obama and another career pol (Perry) who doesn't care about our sovereignty, culture, or what really worries Americans.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"...maybe the greatest threat to Perry, since his squishiness on immigration ..."
So long as someone calls him to the mat for it, otherwise they're all squishes.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse>>The gap between voters and elites is large on immigration, perhaps larger than on any other issue...
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Absolutely! The intensity of conservative sentiment on this issue is palpable. But in every bit of post-election analysis from the MSM -- particularly in various special or off-year elections -- the spin has always been furious in denying the power of the issue, often denying it with sneers and contempt.
I know of no other case where the fury of the public has been so great as to back down the congress the way it did over the Bush/Kennedy/McCain amnesty bill. With a Republican in the WH strongly supporting this bill along with the GOP establishment, passing it should have been a lock from a purely political perspective. It was beaten back by pure pitchfork power.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAnd darned near sunk McCain's candidacy.
Except that it didn't sink it, and he won the nomination.
So, what does that mean for 2012? Are we willing, again, to let that pitchfork power counterbalance an otherwise bad policy leaning? Are we still that divided on what is an extremely complex issue? Are we willing to overlook it if the choices don't give us much to choose from?
Maybe.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIf the Tea Party agrees that this issue is a truth-teller as the article suggests, then we have ourselves a horserace.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseHere's a great example:
External Link
The creepy, divorced from reality feel to the language is telling. The writer goes to great pains to avoid stating the obvious. Is she nuts or lying?
Anyway, who's going to go after Perry on immigration? Mitt? Fat chance of that happening. Bachmann could, but she's being shunned. That leaves the lesser lights and none of them seem to care about the issue.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseCan't disagree. If the battle is between BullMitt and Perry we truly are doomed. Of course it might just happen that the two would fight each other like the Kilkenny cats* on everything else (with the same result), leaving a big opening for Bachmann.
Go ahead and laugh. Stranger things have happened.
* External Link
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseImmigration is not even close to the top issue for most Republicans today,
Oh REALLY? Even when it's so tied in with jobs, welfare expenditures, health care? Yeah keep telling yourselves that. I think the GOP is a little too comfortable with IT companies importing H1-B programmers from Chindia while letting expensive native-born employees go.
Maybe it's the cheap labor and docile servants they get from south of the border.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAnother pro-amnesty phrase that is a flashing light: "secure the border FIRST."
Beware of the "F" word.
When you hear pols who are weak on illegal immigration such as Rick Perry, John McCain, Lindsey Graham use this phrase, you know they support some form of amnesty after the borders are (claimed to be) "secure" -- like how Obama and Napolitano are claiming the borders are now secure.
Our borders must be secured and our current laws enforced PERIOD -- without these long overdue measures being tied or connected to an amnesty scheme.
This attrition strategy will decrease the illegal population over time. Romney seemed to support attrition in 2008; I wonder if he still does...
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseMark,
Great point on Perry. For me, his stance on immigration actually provided evidence of what the Washington Post says about conservatives: That having a left-wing/RINO position on illegal immigration is highly correlated with having a left-wing/RINO position on a host of issues.
First, the facts: Perry is terrible on illegal immigration. He's for the whole panoply: open borders, amnesty, giving government incentives and welfare to illegals (like instate tuition), not having a fence or sanctions on law-breaking employers. If he becomes president, it will be "Nixon in China" for illegal immigration -- the "conservative" who tries to push through a long-standing policy goal of the Left (of course, Bush tried this too).
But my suspicions on him re. immigration led me to see that they went hand in hand with a larger RINO policy portfolio: Pushing big-government, crony capitalist approaches on the economy; supporting a robust welfare state without any attempt to reform it; sneaking through tax hikes as "fees"; the Gardasil mandate; supporting programs like TARP. The man might as well be Lindsey Graham.
Like you say, he's all swagger. What's appalling is how few conservatives fail to see the policies beyond the swagger. It seems that if you "talk Texas," people just assume you're "the most conservative candidate out there." Right, just like Bush. What's clear is that if PErry's any sort of conservative, it's a "compassionate" one. That approach is not what this country needs -- and neither do we need to take in another 15% of Mexico's population illegally (or give citizenship to the 15% here illegally).
Perry's a dud, he's no conservative, and his immigration stance is the stench that betrays a much larger portfolio of rotten, non-conservative policies he's got to his (formerly Democratic) name.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseBut...but...but...we'd rather have a beer with him! Isn't that the best way to decide who the leader of the free world will be?
Very well said. Bush proved that Texas swagger don't mean diddly. Shouldn't we have learned that from LBJ?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseSupport Perry or don't, but your attack on Perry supporters as shallow is misplaced. Perry's stand on immigration has been shaped by political realities in Texas. The issue is more complicated than your facile description.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse“If a candidate is squishy on immigration, that symbolically suggests that he’s probably unreliable on a whole host of other conservative issues.”
Exactly. Reducing immigration - illegal AND legal - is in itself a big issue for me, but a candidate's stand on the issue is also a reflection of his willingness to stand up to the business lobby on other issues, or whether he's just a tool for moneyed interests. I'm a free market Republican, but there are times the business lobby is looking only after itself and not the best interests of the U.S. (see: the mortgage crisis, free trade with China, etc.)
There is zero economic justification for illegal immigration, especially at 9.1% unemployment. If a candidate's defending illegal immigrants then it says that a) he's willing to lie to me profusely; b) he will spend his administration pursuing all sorts of policies that benefit cronies and contributors, not the American people.
Perry has lost my complete confidence on this matter - in-state tuition, NO E-Verify, NO internal enforcement, no border wall - and a few last minute lies won't be winning it back. Romney still has a chance, but it's not looking good.
I have grown tired alleged conservatives who don't do squat to move this country to the right, but who can be reliably counted on to lower taxes on the rich. I won't be voting for one of them again.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbusePerry could move the country right just by sitting in the oval office with his six-shooter. I will vote for him if he can win the primaries.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe left is going to hype the immigration issue to get the conservatives' eyes off the economy. Then they get to call us racists while we ignore the depression. It's nice that they are this desperate, but we still need to watch the ball.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseExcept that illegal immigration IS the economy.
Even Brookings has put out studies showing that illegal immigration leads to less employment for low-skilled Americans, to wage deflation for those who still have jobs ... and we all know what our economic future will look like if it's going to depend on a population bloc where 45% have less than an 8th-grade education and their children (the first thing we can agree on is that it's the parents, not the schools, that determine a kid's success in attaining an education).
Look at the comments to articles about illegal immigration. It unites the Average Joes on the left and right in opposition, just as it unites our politicians in support. The left doesn't call the right "racist" on immigration -- it accuses us for supporting big business' desire for slave labor and worsening the problem.
Yes, we of course know the NY Times and Washington Post will call any politician (right or left) who dares criticize our de fact amnesty policy for illegals. But, as we all know, the elites on this question are not the voting public.
Studies consistently show 80% of Americans want immigration enforcement. If Romney or Bachmann talk about this issue, they'll get the ire of the left-wing media ... but probably a lot of support from Democratic voters (and of course independents and conservatives).
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseLet them do it. We shall see if the American people agree with them.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe question of whether "immigration" is an important issue for Americans or not is clouded by lumping together a) legal immigration, and b) illegal alien incursion. Most people, especially conservatives but really almost everyone, think of immigration and illegal alien incursion very differently, just as we think of shopping and shoplifting very differently. So when pollsters ask, is immigration an important issue to you, many voters signal no because to them, the question is about immigration, not lawbreaking illegals.
The apparent contradiction is why when McCain and other amnesty types thought they could ram through amnesty because polls showed voters had no strong feelings about "immigration," they were taken by surprise by the level of opposition there is to the idea of specifically rewarding illegals.
Pollsters need to have two questions.
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