November 20, 2008
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GOP stares down immigration divide

By Reid Wilson, Arizona Capitol Times correspondent

NORTH MYRTLE BEACH, South Carolina - To hear Republican pollster Whit Ayers tell it, the future of the GOP is in serious jeopardy if it can't woo more Hispanic voters to its side by moderating its position on immigration.

As the prominent numbers wizard presented his case to a gathering of Republican National Committee members, Arizona GOP chair Randy Pullen shook his head. "He's got it wrong," Pullen said.

The debate over the Republican approach to immigration reform has become increasingly crucial to the party's electoral success. And it's not one that will be decided pleasantly, or soon, as demonstrated during the election season by the divergent opinions between Washington-based consultants and local activists across the country.

Hispanics are the fastest-growing minority group in America, and Republican strategists worry the group could slip out of their party's grasp. Consultants and activists both blame hard-core rhetoric, especially that which surrounded contentious debates over immigration legislation in the summer of 2005. But while everyone agrees that the few who use demagogic language are poisoning the well, the two sides disagree on just what moderation means.

One thing is for sure: The party sports a damaged brand among Hispanic voters. In 2004, President Bush carried 44 percent of the Hispanic vote, losing the group to John Kerry by nine points. This year, exit polls showed Barack Obama beating John McCain among Hispanic voters by a margin of 67 percent to 31 percent, a shockingly poor result for the Arizona senator whose name is frequently associated with a moderate approach to immigration reform. In Arizona, McCain lost Hispanic voters by a 56 percent-to-41 percent margin.

"The Hispanic vote is probably the most important swing-voter group in the American electorate over the next decade," Ayers said in an interview. While the white proportion of the electorate shrinks with the growth of African Americans and Hispanics, the GOP is losing badly among both minority groups, bringing up worries the party is destined to be pigeon-holed as the "white" party.

With what Ayers calls mega-states - California, Texas, New York and Florida, which combine for 147 electoral votes - sporting a lower proportion of white voters than the nation at large, the GOP faces a problem on a presidential level.

"Looking at the long-term demographic trends, it is difficult to see how Republicans remain competitive in the Electoral College unless they start to do significantly better among minorities," Ayers said.

"Virtually everybody believes that America should control its borders. That's true of Hispanics and non-Hispanics. The difference is what happens to the Hispanics that are currently residing in America and the tone that is used to discuss their fate," Ayers added. "It is very difficult to imagine Republicans performing competitively among Hispanic voters if prominent Republicans are demonizing Hispanics and threatening to throw 12 million of them out of the country."

Pullen agreed that the rhetoric needs to be modified. "I think there is a problem if there is a segment of people out there demagoguing on the issue, on both sides," he said. "A lot of them aren't even Republicans."

But Pullen disagrees with the contention that Hispanic voters can be won over if the GOP modifies its stance on immigration reform. "What do we gain from that (moderation)?" Pullen said. "When we pass conservative ballot issues in Arizona that Latinos vote for, the ones that are here legally understand that the people the illegal ones impact the most is" Hispanics in the U.S. legally. "I'm just so tired about hearing all these people pontificate about, ‘Oh, the Republican Party has got to change its position on immigration.' I don't think we need to change at all.

"What we need to do is to develop a core of conservative Latino leadership," he continued. "Those elected officials will attract the volunteers and the supporters that we need in the Republican Party. If we don't help Latinos get elected to office, they're never going to seriously believe we want them involved."

But the state Republican Party and its activists have long been at odds with the party's own elected leaders. Arizona GOP grassroots, along with Pullen and the other party officials they elected, sharply criticized McCain, Kyl and Flake for their roles in pushing for legislation that would have allowed illegal immigrants to earn citizenship without being deported.

The three were tagged "pro-amnesty" by critics. And Kyl, who ranks among the most conservative members of the Senate, was derided as being a liberal because of his support for McCain's bill.

U.S. Rep. Jeff Flake said: "We have to recognize that we need a comprehensive solution that deals with border security and that also deals with those who are here illegally now and deals with (them) in a rational way. You can continue to win a legislative district or even a congressional district just playing to one segment of the base given the way the lines are drawn (in Arizona).

But if you want to win statewide, "Republicans must appeal to a broader swath of voters," Flake said. "We're relegating ourselves to a minority-party statewide.

"Nobody's backing away from the border security that we need, but you just cannot continue to be all-immigration all the time," Flake said. He criticized the state GOP for deciding to "go after Jon Kyl and John McCain for trying to reach a comprehensive solution."

While anti-immigration ballot initiatives have passed statewide, "you see what the activists did in 2006," said one Republican congressional aide. "As far as candidates go, they lost all the way around."

At the gathering in Myrtle Beach, a meeting during which top Republicans blew off steam with frank post-mortems of the 2008 elections, Pullen was far from the only party chairman or committee member to express dissatisfaction with any moderation of the party's stances. It's a debate being repeated in states around the country, and it's likely to play at least some role in January's election of a new Republican National Committee chairman.

The impact the issue has on the Republican Party as a whole is playing out in Arizona as well, as legislative districts meet to elect their delegates to the state convention. While no strong challenger to Pullen has emerged, many have tested the water, according to the GOP aide.

The aide, who spoke on condition of anonymity due to intra-party sensitivity on the topic, wondered whether immigration, and its attending distance between the state party and the elected officials, would bring out a more centrist candidate.

The question, he said, is one of counting the votes. "Does the Pullen faction control the slates coming out of the districts or don't they?" the aide asked. "It's politics at the most basic level."

http://www.azcapitoltimes.com/story.cfm?id=9895