Thread: Jeff Sessions Pens 25-Page Roadmap for New Republican Majority

by Matthew Boyle
12 Jan 2015 Washington, DC
1038 comments

Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) is explaining what he thinks the Republican Party position on immigration should be in a 25-page document delivered to all Republican members of Congress and all their key staffers on Capitol Hill.

Sessions staff tell Breitbart News that copies of the “Immigration Handbook For The New Republican Majority” were hand-delivered on Monday. Sessions is also planning to discuss the memo’s themes, they say, with his colleagues at the GOP retreat in Hershey, Pennsylvania, this coming weekend. It will also be discussed during an immigration meeting with conservative offices on Tuesday. Sessions also is aiming to get the document printed as a handout or pamphlet that can be given to grassroots activists nationwide in an effort to empower their efforts to hold politicians in both political parties accountable on immigration.

“‘Immigration reform’ may be the single most abused phrase in the English language. It has become a legislative honorific almost exclusively reserved for proposals which benefit everyone but actual American citizens,” Sessions writes in the introduction.

Consider the recent Obama-backed “immigration reform” bill rejected by Congress. That bill—the culmination of a $1.5 billion lobbying effort—doubled the influx of foreign workers to benefit corporate lobbyists, offered sweeping amnesty to benefit illegal immigrants, and collapsed enforcement to benefit groups in the Democrat political machine that advocate open borders. But for American citizens, the legislation offered nothing except lower wages, higher unemployment, and a heavier tax burden.

Sessions explains it is an “incoherent question” to assert that anyone who opposes the particular policies in the “Gang of Eight” immigration bill—whether done in a comprehensive bill, or in piecemeal fashion—is against “immigration reform” in general.

“Nobody says opponents of tax hikes oppose ‘tax reform,’ or that opponents of cap-and-trade oppose ‘energy reform,’” Sessions writes, before providing one particular answer Republicans could give when asked that trap question about what their “immigration reform” position happens to be:

I am opposed to any immigration policy which makes it harder for the unemployed to find jobs and easier for employers to keep pay low. If by “immigration reform,” you mean helping the unemployed return to the workforce, limiting work visas so wages can rise, and establishing firm control over entry and exit in the United States, then I am for it. Which do you mean?

Democrats, Sessions notes, have already answered that question—aligning themselves entirely with special interests instead of the American people. “In the House and Senate, they were virtually unanimous in their support of the 2013 ‘Gang of Eight’ immigration bill,” Sessions says of the Democrats. “But their strategy—appealing to the interest groups, donors, advocacy coalitions, and media personalities who oppose any sensible immigration controls—rests on the assumption that Republicans will compete for the same audience. But we were not elected to clamor for the affections of Washington pundits and trendy CEOs.”

Instead of competing for special interests’ support, and support from illegal aliens, Sessions said Republicans should compete for support from the hundreds of millions of Americans who have been ignored by career politicians—especially Democrats—in the immigration debate.

“The largest untapped constituency in American politics are the 300 million American citizens who have been completely left out of the immigration debate,” Sessions said. “Speak to that constituency—with clarity and compassion—and change the issue forever.”

Sessions writes that Republicans lost the 2012 presidential election because, according to exit polls, voters believed the GOP was “out of touch with the concerns of most people in the United States today.”

Sessions writes that: “This is evidenced by the fact that Romney trailed Obama among voters earning $30,000 to $50,000 by 15 points and among voters earning under $30,000 by 28 points. Republicans cannot win in 2016 without these voters, and Republicans cannot win these voters unless they prove that they are willing to break from the donor class and defend the working class. Donors don’t win elections; voters win elections. And the voters need our help.”

Sessions points to recent jobs statistics from Obama’s own Department of Labor.

Bureau of Labor Statistics data, he writes, shows that “all net employment gains since the recession have gone to foreign workers while 1.5 million fewer U.S.-born Americans hold jobs today than did then—despite the total population of U.S.-born adults increasing by 11 million over that same time.”

Sessions questions, however, why those facts from BLS are “revealed” in plain sight.

On no issue is there a greater separation between the everyday citizen and the political elite than on the issue of immigration. For decades, the American people have begged and pleaded for a just and lawful system of immigration that serves their interests—but their demands are refused. For years, Americans have been scorned and mocked by the elite denizens of Washington and Wall Street for having legitimate concerns about how uncontrolled immigration impacts their jobs, wages, schools, hospitals, police departments, and communities. But those who do the mocking are often ensconced behind gated compounds, guarded private schools, chauffeured SUVs, and fenced-off estates.

Now six-pages deep into the manifesto against elitist immigration policies, Sessions begins walking Republicans through specific issues on immigration—providing statistics, polling data, explanatory information, and other details they need to effectively use the issue to help Americans, and beat Democrats.

Sessions starts with explaining the one part of immigration where Republicans solidly oppose Democrats: President Obama’s executive amnesty. In addition to quoting Republican National Committee (RNC) chairman Reince Priebus’s pre-election promise that Republicans would do everything in their power to stop Obama, Sessions lays out why it’s bad—and what the GOP can do to stop him.

The 114th Congress opens under the shadow of President Obama’s recent immigration orders. President Obama has declared null and void the sovereign immigration laws of the United States in order to implement immigration measures the Congress has repeatedly and explicitly rejected. His order grants five million illegal immigrants work permits, Social Security, Medicare, and free tax credits—taking jobs and benefits directly from struggling American workers. U.S. citizens have been stripped of their protections they are entitled to under law. President Obama himself once admitted that only an Emperor could issue such edicts. Yet here we stand today in 2015, living under imperial decrees that defy the will of the people, the laws their government has passed, and the Constitution we took an oath to uphold. How Congress responds to this emergency will define its legacy.

Sessions worries, as National Review’s Ramesh Ponnuru does, about “under-reacting” to Obama’s actions.

“We are already well down this road,” of under-reacting, Sessions wrote. “The most emphasized public priorities for the new GOP Congress cover everything from the Keystone Pipeline to enacting Trade Promotion Authority, while funding DHS is treated more as a hurdle to clear than a line in the sand.”

Sessions notes that Congress “has the power” to stop Obama “by denying funds for its implementation.”

Surely, Congress must not allow the President a single dime to carry out an illegal order that Congress has rejected and which supplants the laws Congress has passed. A constitutional breach of this magnitude demands nothing less than a vigorous, public, disciplined campaign to rally the nation behind a Republican effort to deny the President the funds he would need to carry it out. Yet presently no such public campaign exists: we receive more talking points about the trade bills and a pipeline than about saving the American worker from the dissolution of our borders. Is our goal to win this fight, or just to “move past” it?

Sessions then walks Republicans through how they can win against Democrats on more aspects of immigration, laying out what the GOP position should be.

The document details how former Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) director John Morton issued the Morton Memos bearing his name. These memos led to an “enforcement collapse.” Sessions then shifts into how immigration is intricately connected with the economy, in that the numbers of foreign workers imported into the country hurt American workers.

From there, it details how the welfare state—which Republicans are supposed to be opposed to—thrives because of open borders immigration policies. And Sessions provides polling data and messaging suggestions for Republicans who seek to represent their constituents rather than special interests such as Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg’s lobbying firm FWD.us. Sessions’ document then turns to what it calls the “hoax” Silicon Valley perpetrates on the political debate, in which lobbyists for high tech companies argue—incorrectly—there is a shortage of workers in America available to do such high-tech jobs.

Sessions’ document concludes by asking three “essential questions.”

“Is America a sovereign nation that has the right to control its borders and decide who comes to live and work here?”

“Should American immigration laws serve the just interests of the country and its citizens? And do those citizens have the right to expect and demand that the laws passed by their elected representatives be enforced?”

“If we believe the answers to these questions are ‘yes,’ then we have no choice but to fight—and to win,” Sessions concluded. “Why were we elected, if not to serve the people who sent us here?”

http://www.breitbart.com/big-governm...dmap-document/

Sessions reveals plan to defend 'scorned and mocked' Americans

Published: 14 hours ago
Bob Unruh

At the end of 2014, President Obama boasted that the year was the strongest for job growth in the U.S. since the 1990s and “businesses” have added 11 million new jobs over 57 months, and the Washington Post’s “The Fix” fact-checker concluded his statements mostly were true.

But unmentioned by Obama was another federal report concluding that all net employment gains since the Obama recession have gone to foreign workers while 1.5 million fewer U.S.-born Americans have jobs now. The report is cited by Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., in a plan he is delivering to GOP members of Congress to restore Washington’s representation to Americans, to whom its loyalty should be directed.

“While the media celebrates the recent jobs numbers, little-noticed data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics was nowhere to be seen in the big papers or the nightly news,” he said in his new “Immigration Handbook for The New Republican Majority.”

He described it as a memo for Republican members prepared for the upcoming GOP retreat.

“So too has it been absent from the official broadcasts of the Republican Party. Yet the finding was remarkable: according to the BLS, all net employment gains since the recession have gone to foreign workers while 1.5 million fewer U.S.-born Americans hold today than did then – despite the total population of U.S.-born adults increasing by 11 million over that same time.”

He continued: “On no issue is there a greater separation between the everyday citizen and the political elite than on the issue of immigration. For decades, the American people have begged and pleaded for a just and lawful system of immigration that serves their interests – but their demands are refused. For years, Americans have been scorned and mocked by the elite denizens of Washington and Wall Street for having legitimate concerns about how uncontrolled immigration impacts their jobs, wages, schools, hospitals, police departments, and communities, but those who do the mocking are often ensconced behind gated compounds, guarded private schools, chauffeured SUVs, and fenced-off estates.”

The House Republican leadership’s capitulation to Obama regarding immigration and health care prompted a campaign to enable constituents to urge their representatives to replace House Speaker John Boehner, who last week overcame a challenge to his position.

The campaign points out that under Boehner’s leadership, the GOP majority in the House agreed before Christmas to continued funding for Obamacare and Obama’s amnesty program – two issues on which voters across America showed opposition in the 2014 midterms.

Sessions’ outline says the GOP message to the American people should be: “You are right. And you’ve been right from the beginning. We hear you and we will deliver.”

“Exit polls were unequivocal,” Sessions continued. “More than 3 in 4 voters cited immigration as an important factor in their vote, believed that U.S. workers should get priority for jobs, and opposed the president’s plans for executive amnesty.

“We may have won an election, but the American people will only win when we honor the trust placed in us and use the powers they have lent to us to champion their interests. Congress has the power to stop this action by denying funds for its implementation. Surely, Congress must not allow the president a single dime to carry out an illegal order that Congress has rejected and which supplants the laws Congress has passed. A constitutional breach of this magnitude demands nothing less than a vigorous, public, disciplined campaign to rally the nation behind a Republican effort to deny the president the funds he would need to carry it out.”

He said: “This effort could be complimented by common sense enforcement-only measures like universal E-Verify, ending catch-and-release, mandatory repatriation for unaccompanied alien minors, ending asylum loopholes, and closing off welfare for illegal immigrants. No enforcement plan can be successful that does not block the president from continuing to release illegal immigrants into the United States and provide them with immigration benefits; a ‘border security’ plan that does not include these elements may end up as nothing more than a slush fund used by the administration to resettle illegal immigrants in the U.S. interior.”

Sessions’ outline said the problem is huge.

“In 2012 alone 250,000 individuals are estimated to have overstayed their visas and remained in the country unlawfully. Overall, in 2014 only a miniscule 0.05 percent of the nation’s roughly 12 million illegal immigrants were removed who were not explicit agency ‘priorities.’ If you don’t meet a ‘priority,’ you are basically immune from enforcement. Even including ‘priority’ cases, 99 percent of illegal immigrants were still placed beyond the reach of immigration law,” he said. “Even the removal of criminal aliens has continued to freefall. … DHS documents show that the administration freed 30,000 convicted criminal aliens into U.S. communities in 2014. Overall, there are about 167,000 convicted criminal aliens who were ordered removed that are now at large in the United States.”

The president’s response?

Sessions wrote: “In recent months President Obama has also unilaterally removed restrictions on admission of foreign nationals with limited terror ties; increased the admission of foreign workers by 100,000; expedited chain migration from Haiti; extended amnesty provisions for Honduran and Nicaraguan nationals; and attempted to recruit illegal immigrants for military positions even as American service members are being laid off.”

The result is that a huge number of immigrants, including those in the U.S. illegally, are taking jobs from American workers and driving down wages, he said.

“We need to get our workers off of unemployment and into good-paying jobs that can support a family – but Democrats voted to double the number of workers brought in for employers to hire in their place. Every Democrat senator backed a plan for lower wages and higher unemployment.”

And what can Congress do?

Make mandatory E-Verify to protect American jobs and wages, end tax credits and welfare for illegal immigrants, close asylum loopholes, cancel federal funds for sanctuary cities, authorize local officials to coordinate with ICE, make overstaying a visa a crime, ending catch-and-release with expedited deportations and more, Sessions said.

Sessions explained: “From 2000 through 2014 – when 14 million new permanent legal immigrants were admitted to the U.S. in addition to the illegal immigration flow – all net employment gains went to immigrant workers. This trend occurred even as the population of U.S.-born workers climbed by 16.4 million. … Perhaps unsurprisingly given the slack labor market, median weekly earnings today are lower than in 2000. … The U.S. Department of Commerce informs us that ‘today’s typical 18- to 34-year-old earns about $2,000 less per year (adjusted for inflation) than their counterpart in 1980.’”

He said since that year, through 2013, the “immigrant population tripled from 14 million to more than 41 million.”

“Simply put, we have more jobseekers than jobs,” he said. “Republicans have a historic obligation – and opportunity – to right that wrong, to return this government to its people, and to tell the special interests: Get lost.”

http://www.wnd.com/2015/01/sessions-...festo-for-gop/

Fantastic chapter on the tech worker shortage hoax, too. The only additional detail would be the brewing scandal of US universities preferentially recruiting foreign students. This is especially bad when the land grant schools do it, because land grant schools have a specific mandate to educate Americans. If you know a bright kid who had to settle for a lesser-ranked school than what he or she should've been able to attain, this may be why.

Senator Sessions has nailed it! What a wonderful piece of work he has provided to his colleagues and Americans. Senator Sessions, thank you, thank you, thank you.

By being pushed our of a committee chair, trying now to publish this 25 page piece, might Jeff Sessions now be ready to be pushed to run for the highest office of our land? This piece reduced to pamphlet sized campaign piece, funded by citizens for Sessions, would be powerfully persuasive in opening eyes and prompting getting to he polls. Even of he did not win the nomination, he would have made powerful difference for the people, especially if he forced this into the party platform for 2016, causing it to be carried into the final debates between the two allowed general election nominees.

Or, is this an exploratory piece to encourage us to encourage him to form an exploratory committee? Who knows him well enough to make the phone call and get his attentive ear?