Legal Immigration PAC says adios to ex-CNN anchor Lou Dobbs
Posted on Friday, December 04 @ 00:50:24 EST
Topic: Lou Dobbs CNN Anchor
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 Note: We are not an 'anti-immigrant group.' We support legal immigration so we would have appreciated the reporter clarifying this by stating 'anti-illegal immigration group.' There is a big difference.
A leading anti-immigrant group bid adios to Lou Dobbs on Thursday, now that the ex-CNN anchor is casting himself as a true friend to immigrants as he mulls a run for office.
The Americans for Legal Immigration PAC announced they were yanking their support for Dobbs, who in recent days has been trying to deny his record as an often caustic foe of giving illegal immigrants a path to citizenship.
Subjects: Illegal Immigration, Lou Dobbs, Americans for Legal Immigration PAC, William Gheen, withdraw support, amnesty
December 3, 2009
David Saltonstall
NYDailyNews.com
"To be honest with you, I don't know what [Dobbs] is doing," said ALIPAC president William Gheen. "But I know that a large segment of his base feels betrayed."
The dust-up began last weeks ago, when in a little-noticed interview with Telemundo, Dobbs expressed shock that anyone would consider him anti-immigrant.
"Whatever you have thought of me in the past," Dobbs told Telemundo, "I can tell you right now that I am one of your greatest friends and I mean for us to work together."
He then voiced support for granting citizenship to the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants now living in the U.S., saying at one point, "We need the ability to legalize illegal immigrants under certain conditions."
The abrupt flip-flop comes as Dobbs is mulling a run for U.S. Senate in Democratic-leaning New Jersey in 2012 against, and possibly even a run for president
His most recent comments are a long way from Dobbs' earlier tirades as a host on CNN, where he cultivated an image as a populist firebrand vehemently opposed to any kind of "amnesty" for illegal immigrants.
Over the years, Dobbs has claimed that "an invasion of illegal aliens" had caused a spike in U.S. leprosy cases - a report later dismissed as factually incorrect.
He lent credence to conspiracy theories suggesting that the U.S. was eager to form a "North American Union" with Canada and Mexico, much like the European Union.
And he once asserted that a chief interest of the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce was "Mexico's export of drugs and illegal aliens to the United States."
Dobbs declined to comment Thursday, but a spokesman insisted the former anchor's views on immigration had long been "misinterpreted."
"He has always been right down the middle," said Dobbs spokesman Robert
Dilenschneider.
That's not an argument ALIPAC - which in 2008 raised $660,000 in pledges aimed at convincing Dobbs to run for president - was willing to buy Thursday.
"It's been so bizarre," said Gheen. "A lot of our supporters are asking, 'Where's the part in the movie when we find out that someone is holding someone hostage over him?'"
"Apparently, whenever someone looks at ascending into the Presidency or Senate, there appears to be a one party line [on the need for immigration reform]," said Gheen. "And Mr. Dobbs has started reciting that one party line."
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