Thread: POLITICO: "Immigration crosses party lines"

By: Josh Kraushaar

This week Politico launches Racetrack, an inside look at the congressional campaigns that will decide the balance of power on Capitol Hill in the 2008 elections. Racetrack features expert reporting and analysis about the candidates, consultants, strategies and tactics in a political arena where the stakes couldn’t be higher.

Immigration was, until recently, an issue likely to cause only Republicans political heartburn. With the party’s Big Business factions battling its increasingly vocal secure-the-borders grass-roots advocates, immigration looked like an internal GOP squabble that had little electoral upside.

That now seems like ancient history.

Immigration is emerging as an issue that is resonating with independent voters — the very ones who carried Democrats to landslide victories in 2006, winning control of the House and Senate. And it’s presenting Democratic candidates with the challenge of how to discuss an issue they’re not used to being defensive about.

Immigration is now viewed as an issue that affects key domestic areas long considered Democratic turf: health care, crime and education.

Growing numbers of immigrants — legal and illegal — are changing the composition of affluent suburban towns across the country, impacting independent and Democratic-leaning voters, who are concerned that schools are overcrowded, health care systems are strained and crime is on the rise.

Forty percent of respondents to a newly conducted, Democrat-sponsored Democracy Corps poll said the main reason the country is going in the wrong direction is that “our borders have been left unprotected and illegal immigration is growing.â€

Immigration is emerging as an issue that is resonating with independent voters — the very ones who carried Democrats to landslide victories in 2006, winning control of the House and Senate. And it’s presenting Democratic candidates with the challenge of how to discuss an issue they’re not used to being defensive about.

Let this be a warning to Hillary and any candidate who supports a policy of providing any form of amnesty (delayed or whatever) to illegals. The American people will NOT accept any form of amnesty for lawbreakers.