We need to post a comment to set Mr. Navarrette straight!
Navarrette: Immigration sunk GOP with Latinos
By Ruben Navarrette | Sunday, November 12, 2006
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Now that Democrats have taken control of both the House and Senate, questions are being asked about what this dramatic turn of events means for the immigration debate and for President Bush’s chances to get a comprehensive reform package through Congress.

It could mean quite a bit. President Bush told reporters in his post-election news conference that his administration now had “a good chance” at comprehensive reform, which would include guest workers along with a path to legalization for millions of illegal immigrants.

He may be right. The conventional wisdom had been that comprehensive reform — what the closed-border, closed-mind crowd calls “amnesty” — was dead. Then came the midterm elections. Now what is dead is the conventional wisdom.

Political pundits and congressional observers have been telling us for months that any Republican who jumped on the bandwagon of immigration restrictions and anti-amnesty rhetoric would ride to certain victory.

A CNN exit poll found that among voters who listed illegal immigration as their No. 1 issue, 51 percent thought Republicans would do a better job controlling it while 46 percent said Democrats would. That’s not much of a gap, given the lengths to which Republicans went to claim this issue as their own — and at no small cost.

After decades of Latino outreach efforts by Republicans, which culminated in President Bush walking off with 44 percent of the Latino vote in the 2004 election, congressional hard-liners did a good job of blowing up every bridge. Polls taken before the election showed that while immigration didn’t start out a top concern for many Latino voters, the issue was likely to influence the choices Latinos made in the voting booths. Tired of being pushed around by opportunistic politicians, many Latinos seemed intent on seizing the opportunity to push back.

They did just that. In fact, Latinos delivered what President Bush might call a “thumpin.” According to exit polls cited by The Wall Street Journal, more than 70 percent of Hispanics voted Democratic in contests for House seats. Just 27 percent voted Republican — an 11-percentage-point drop from the level of support Latinos gave Republican candidates in the 2002 midterms.

That means that Latinos are an important part of the coalition that helped put Democrats back in power, and that should give them some capital. Now all they need to do is cash it for the sake of achieving what a majority of Americans seem to be saying they want — comprehensive immigration reform and leaders who know the difference between polemics and progress.

Contact Ruben Navarrette at ruben.navarrette@uniontrib.com.

The following are comments from the readers. In no way do they represent the views of the Quad-City Times or Lee Enterprises.
PJ Goober
wrote on November 12, 2006 7:31 AM:
""achieving what a majority of Americans seem to be saying they want — comprehensive immigration reform and leaders who know the difference between polemics and progress." Many Democrats had to take a hardline stance to win over conservative districts. If they go along with earned legalization of undocumented immigrants and a guest worker program with a path to citizenship, they probaly won't keep thier seats. I think the main message of the election was about the war in iraq. Case in point: can anyone point to one Democrat who won a seat from a Republican by heavily campaigned on comprehensive immigration reform? Thats pretty much the exact opposite of how the Democrats won more seats (I am not talking about the liberal-leaning seats they already had)."

not true
wrote on November 12, 2006 9:14 AM:
"Most legal latinos don't appreciate illegal immigration any more than any one else."

Seeking the truth
wrote on November 12, 2006 10:34 AM:
""immigration reform" is one more set of code words from the part of the political spectrum that loves them so much. Rather than encoding, why not tell the citizens what is really meant? You can be certain the "reform" includes leniency, amnesty, hiding, subversion, application for pity, and non-prosecution of law breaking supporters."

Gustavo
wrote on November 12, 2006 11:21 AM:
"Good article and to the point. I was wondering why it seemed no analyst connected the dots between the immigration issue and the Republican "thumpin'". No someone has, well done. Unfortunately, many are still blinded or prefer not to see the connection. Bad for them, perhaps, years from now it will be said that this is when the Republican party started to fade away. 11% drop, who in his right mind could ignore that and think that nothing is brewing here! Also, as you know, most anti-immigration hardliners are now out of office. That must mean something!!"

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