Immigration battle threatens to dwarf debt-limit fight as many Republicans fear power
Immigration battle threatens to dwarf debt-limit fight as many Republicans fear power of 17 MILLION newly legalized loyal Democrats
By David Martosko, U.s. Political Editor
PUBLISHED: 01:49 EST, 17 October 2013 | UPDATED: 02:31 EST, 17 October 2013
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This young protester in Los Angeles is some Republicans' worst nightmare: an immigrant with no legal papers who will one day vote for the Democrats who offered him a path to citizenship
*One GOP congressman says the president is trying 'to destroy the Republican party' with his immigration policy
*If a senate immigration bill favored by the White House became law, 17.3 million newly legalized Hispanic immigrants would become voters
*81 per cent of non-native Hispanics voted for President Obama last year
*No modern Republican presidential candidate has attracted more than 43 per cent of their votes
*Obama wants 'comprehensive' immigration reform, including a 'pathway to citizenship for the 11 million immigrants living illegally in the U.S.
*Some Republican lawmakers are trying the same piecemeal approach with immigration that failed them in the government shutdown fight
*One GOP aide says his colleagues fear 'changing voting patterns for maybe 100 years and creating natural advantages' for Democrats
Republicans' new worst fear isn't defaulting on America's debts. If an immigration policy favored by the White House and Senate Democrats should become law, 17.3 million newly legalized immigrant voters would emerge by 2036, eager to reward the party that gave them a path to citizenship.
The White House has shifted gears and put its policy team in immigration overdrive, zooming past the debt crisis that threatened to sink the republic and on to the task of normalizing the estimated 11 million U.S. residents who have no legal basis for being there.
The Democrat-dominated U.S. Senate passed a bill in June that would provide a citizenship path for those who have been in the U.S. since the end of 2011. But as with the early days of the debt crisis and the partial government shutdown, Republican leaders in the House of Representatives aren't eager to consider it.
The White House has avoided saying that it take advantage of a weak House and spend its political capital to push an immigration policy, but Republicans have reason to suspect the other shoe is about to drop.
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President Obama told Univision that he would renew his emphasis on immigration policy 'the day after' the debt-ceiling stalemate ended in Washington
The Center for Immigration Studies, a Washington, D.C. think-tank, projects that the Senate bill, S.744, would add 17.3 million new legal, voting-age U.S. residents to 14.9 million whom analysts already expect to appear without the proposed law.
'To place these figures in perspective,' writes Steven Camarota, the group's director of research, 'the last four presidential elections were decided by 4.5 million votes on average.'
Converting illegal immigrants into citizens has long been a Democratic Party brass ring. And not only, as President Barack Obama told business leaders on Sept. 18, because 'we know ... that that can add potentially a trillion dollars to our economy, and that we will continue to attract the best and brightest talent around the world.'
Hispanics are the biggest ethnic group involved in U.S. immigration. In the 2012 elections, 77 per cent of those who voted supported Democratic candidates for Congress, according to the polling group Latino Decisions. Seventy-five per cent voted for Obama.
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Obama has been 'trying to destroy the Republican Party' with the debt standoff, says Rep. Raul Labrador, 'and I think that anything we negotiate right now with the president on immigration will be with that same goal in mind'
Among Hispanic voters who weren't born in the U.S., Democratic congressional candidates picked up 81 per cent of the vote. Obama rated 80 per cent.
In fact, Republicans' share of Hispanic votes in presidential elections peaked in 2004, at 43 per cent before tumbling in the next two elections.
And the Pew Research Center has consistently found that large majorities Hispanic voters favor policies that produce governments with bigger footprints and more social programs.
'There are things that we know will help strengthen our economy that we could get done before this year is out,' the president said Wednesday night as focus on the debt-limit fix bill moved from the Senate to the House.
'A law to fix our broken immigration system' was first on his wish-list.
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