By TARINI PARTI and BURGESS EVERETT | 6/30/13 6:57 AM EDT
POLITICO



The tea party has a message for Republican senators who voted Thursday for the immigration bill and congressmen who might: Welcome home.

Activists are promising to spend the congressional recess reminding lawmakers who support the Gang of Eight legislation what the base is capable of. Think loud town halls, jammed phone lines and primary challenges down the road — echoes of Obamacare three years ago.

“The anger is more intense now than it was in 2010,” said Judson Phillips, founder of Tea Party Nation. “They are more upset about the amnesty bill than they were about Obamacare.”

But conservatives aren’t united against immigration reform the same way they opposed Obamacare. Some tea party and GOP-affiliated groups including Grover Norquist’s Americans for Tax Reform, American Conservative Union and Faith and Freedom Coalition have expressed support for the Senate’s bill, while acknowledging that the House will have to make some changes. Another group, TheTeaParty.Net, is supporting efforts toward immigration reform, but not the Senate bill, based on concerns of whether how border security provisions will be enforced.

Still, the majority of conservative groups are looking to replicate protests of previous years driven by Obamacare, the 2008 financial bailout, the stimulus bill, cap-and-trade bill and other Obama administration policies, which propelled the Republican House takeover in 2010. But after seeing President Barack Obama win re-election last year and GOP senators negotiate with Democrats, part of what’s driving the tea party is disappointment with the result of their electoral efforts and disenchantment with the Washington crowd.

“Some of these people have been up there so long and have been insulated and live in this bubble and aren’t connected to to the real world,” said Amy Kremer, chairwoman of Tea Party Express. “It’s this attitude of: They know better.”

Former Rep. Allen West, who has hinted he might challenge Sen. Marco Rubio in 2016, pointed to hidden details in the Gang of Eight bill that could cause the conservative base to lose trust in their lawmakers.

“When you get down into it, you see a lot of waivers and sweeteners and then it’s politically driven,” West said.

Kremer predicted that Republican lawmakers will avoid public appearances and other opportunities that might lead to an earful from an angered conservative base when they go back home this summer. Taped town halls became a hallmark of politics in previous summers, as lawmakers were filmed facing angry crowds or uncomfortable questions on both policy and topics like Obama’s birth certificate.

Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.), who co-sponsored the border surge amendment that helped bring 14 Republicans to vote for the Senate bill, told POLITICO he’s ready for what’s coming to him.

“When it gets hot in the kitchen, a lot of people run. I think folks in Tennessee understand that I usually take on the tough issues,” he said.

Corker said he’s faced pitchforks before when taking on the mortgage and the auto industries and expects to face plenty of angry constituents back home this summer as well. But on immigration, he expects eventually the outrage will be directed not at him, but those that voted against the bill.

“Once they understand what this amendment really does — in spite of the demagoguing of some of my colleagues — I think they’ll say: ‘Wait a minute. So people voted against 20,000 border patrol agents?” Corker said.

Rubio, the Florida Republican and former tea party favorite, is an obvious target for the right. Rubio was booed by protesters outside the Capitol earlier this month, and he’s been called out by big-name conservatives such as Sarah Palin and Ann Coulter.

Cindy Lucas, a coordinator with the tea party-affiliated Martin County 9/12 Committee in Florida, said she spent this week trying to sway Rubio from supporting the bill. Next week she expects his phone lines to be “melted” by conservative complains and his offices in Florida barnstormed by agitated constituents, but she’s already moved to the next step.

“We’ve already been out there protesting, not just me – all the tea parties around Florida have already done that,” Lucas said. Now, “there is a move to look for a candidate to primary him out.”

“Conservatives are obviously furious,” Phillips said. “Marco Rubio can forget about his presidential aspirations. He’s not going to be able to hold his Senate seat. And if the House even thinks about passing this, they’re going to be in the minority in 2014.”

Rubio devoted an entire floor speech this week to address the conservative backlash he’s facing, saying he’s not trying to curry favor from any side.

“This isn’t about winning points from the establishment or mainstream media,” Rubio said. “Political pundits, they love to focus on the politics of all this. But for me, this isn’t about catering to any group for political gain.”

He added,“truthfully, it would have been a lot easier to just sit back, vote against any proposal and give speeches about how I would have done it differently.”

Rubio and Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) both avoided the spotlight after the immigration bill passed and did not appear with the rest of the Gang of Eight at a press conference following the historic vote.

Senators aren’t the only target. The issue of immigration now heads over to the House, where many conservatives, facing pressure from their base, have made it clear that they oppose any bill with a pathway to citizenship even with beefed up border security measures.

House Republicans and activists are pressing Speaker John Boehner to invoke the Hastert rule on any immigration legislation, which means he won’t bring the bill to the floor unless it is supported by the majority of Republicans.

Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa), who organized a six-hour press conference in opposition to the Gang of Eight bill last week, told POLITICO that conservatives who support a pathway to citizenship lose the right to be called conservatives.

“They should be worried about labeling themselves as conservatives if they are for sacrificing the rule of law for politically pragmatic reasons, which are by the way, erroneous,” King said. “They’re calling themselves conservatives, but I don’t know if their constituents are going to call them and thank them for being conservatives.”

The national political argument for immigration reform — Republicans need to win a bigger percentage of the growing Hispanic electorate to stay competitive — is not one conservatives are willing to swallow if it means giving 11 million undocumented immigrants a pathway to citizenship.

“People in D.C. are looking at it in terms of: ‘How does this benefit my election instead of is this right for America?’” said Jenny Beth Martin, co-founder of Tea Party Patriots.

The political argument also does not help the majority of House Republicans in the immediate future because they represent districts that have become even more white after redistricting, giving them less of an incentive to vote for immigration. Insulating themselves from a primary challenge in 2014 plays more into House Republicans’ calculus than what the establishment wants.

Several conservatives said they will throw previous voting records out the window and back a primary challenger if a Republican supports immigration reform that includes a pathway to citizenship.

“There are few times that are true litmus tests for conservatives. This is one of those times,” Phillips said.

At the top of everyone’s lists are two primary targets for the 2014 election: Sens. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.). Graham is a Gang of Eight member and Alexander is a sponsor of the border control surge. That list could also include Sens. Kelly Ayotte (R-N.H.), Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) and Rubio in 2016.

“Everybody thinks they are coasting easy. If there is something that could upset the applecart, it’s an amnesty vote,” said Dan Holler, communications director of Heritage Action for America.

If past is prologue, the 14 Republicans who voted for the bill can see their numbers winnowed, said Matt Hoskins, executive director of the Senate Conservatives Fund. Of Republicans who voted for a failed immigration bill in 2007, only Graham and Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) remain. A successful bill in 2006 also drew the support of Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) — the rest of the “aye” votes have left the chamber.

“There is going to be a fallout here for anybody who votes for this bill, and I assume that folks are really going to hear it from their constituents,” Hoskins said. “People talk about it like it’s a political winner, but it costs people their election.”

And it might not be just limited to the 2014 election.

Lucas of the Martin County 9/12 Committee said the immigration bill has her “done with the Republican Party” – although she was open to a Rand Paul candidacy for president; he voted against the bill.

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