Thread: Numbers USA : Before Iowans vote, read this!

From: Roy Beck, President, NumbersUSA
Date: Thursday 3JAN07 2:30 a.m. EST


Before first votes are cast for President, here are some things you need to know about candidates

DEAR IOWA VOTERS CONCERNED ABOUT IMMIGRATION,
(The rest of you American voters may want to listen in since you'll be getting your chance soon.)

To the right is my single overall rating of the Presidential candidates on immigration issues -- updated and modified just today.

Ever since we came up with our Presidential Candidates Grid that rates all candidates in 16 immigration categories, radio hosts and newspaper reporters have been pestering me for one overall immigration rating.

I still hope you'll look at all 16 categories so that you can make your decisions based on your own weighting of the various issues. But the list at right can serve as a quick guide for you.

Iowans, the rest of us need you to vote tonight!

All of us across the nation need you to leave your homes Thursday night and attend a Caucus meeting so that people who are really informed about the immigration positions of the candidates can truly affect the outcome.

Typically, the decisions made by you voters in Iowa (Thursday night) and New Hampshire (next Tuesday) cause about half the candidates to quit and establish the front-runners for the next primaries.

I know that most of you will vote on the basis of several issues, but I hope all of you will give these immigration positions serious consideration.

Please print out this Alert -- and also the GRID for your Party's candidates -- and take to the caucuses to share with others.


McCAIN IS REAL THREAT IN THIS ELECTION


After his leadership for amnesties knocked him out of his front-runner status last spring, Sen. McCain (R-Ariz.) has suddenly been making a come-back in the polls in Iowa and elsewhere for the Republican nomination.

There is a real chance that he could come in third in Iowa where he basically hasn't even tried to gain votes. If he does, you can be sure that the media will declare him the real winner of Iowa, It will be a huge boost to his efforts in the next primaries, especially New Hampshire where polls show him in first place!

This is the nightmare that friends of border security, national sovereignty and the American worker thought had been erased months ago.

I urge all of you who will be voting in Republican elections or who have Republican friends to talk to them about McCain's plans for immigration. He and Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.) have been the greatest champions of flooding our American occupations with foreign workers and of forcing massive congestion in our communities, roads, schools, hospitals and other infrastructure through out-of-control immigration levels.

Look at McCain's record.

As far as protecting America from more immigration threats, nothing is more important Thursday night and next Tuesday than for McCain to have a poor showing.

Please don't sit this one out. McCain would be a continuation of the George Bush open-borders fiasco.


WHAT'S A DEMOCRATIC VOTER TO DO? CAST A SYMBOLIC VOTE?


Sadly, you can see from my ratings to the right that no Democratic candidate has had the political skill or the courage to espouse the anti-amnesty, pro-reduction immigration position of the majority of Democratic voters.

Although there are many Democrats in Congress who are great on immigration, all of the Democrats running for President are close to abysmal.

If you are a Democrat and are thinking about sitting out tonight's caucuses because none of the candidates excite, why don't you go to the caucus and make a real stat ement about immigration?

I have two suggestions for you:

(1) Vote for Sen. Dodd (D-Conn.) and announce that it is simply because he is rated by NumbersUSA as slightly better than the other Democrats on immigration issues. Or ......

(2) Cast your vote for a Democrat not on the ballot -- Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-North Dakota).

Look at Dorgan's record. Since 2001, he has had a B-plus immigration record, and is A-plus in protecting American workers from unfair foreign labor competition. Nobody gave more eloquent speeches this past year on the need to keep immigration in check in order to protect American workers and their families.

Sen. Dorgan isn't running for President, but he is a great choice for casting a symbolic vote to urge the national Democratic Party to reallign itself with Democratic voters on immigration.

***************************
Please note that our ratings do NOT amount to endorsements. Nor do they convey anything about the character, the strength or any other positions about the candidates. We know that every one of these candidates has supporters among the users of NumbersUSA for a lot of different reasons. Our ratings are based overwhelmingly on promises and not on their actions in past political office.
*************************** in this email:
OVERALL Presidential Candidate Ratings On IMMIGRATION
How Well Would Each Candidate PROTECT Workers, Communities and Taxpayers FROM OVER-IMMIGRATION?
(SEE BELOW FOR HOW POINTS WERE ASSIGNED ON 36-POINT SCALE.)

EXCELLENT
34 points:


DUNCAN HUNTER

GOOD
28 points:

FRED THOMPSON
22 points:

MITT ROMNEY

Fair
20 points:

RON PAUL
18 points:

MIKE HUCKABEE

Poor
8 points:

RUDY GIULIANI

Bad
7 points:

CHRIS DODD

JOHN McCAIN
5 points:

JOE BIDEN

JOHN EDWARDS

DENNIS KUCINICH

BILL RICHARDSON
4 points:

HILLARY CLINTON

BARACK OBAMA

HOW POINTS WERE ASSESSED:

Points are based on candidate promises as of 2JAN08 on
(a) amnesty,
(b) stoppping future illegal immigration and
(c) reducing importation of foreign labor competition, plus
(d) rating of past immigration actions in political office.

Look at full ratings in 16 categories at Presidential Candidate Ratings website.

Points were assigned to the ratings for the first four overall categories: 0 points
for "abysmal" rating, 1 for "bad", 3 for "poor", 5 for "fair", 7 for "GOOD" and 9 for "EXCELLENT".


actions in brief:
Iowans, please vote in your caucus


New Hampshire voters, please raise the above ratings at candidate events before next Tuesday's primary


The rest of you, please note that Congress is still out of town but the fax machines are still on, and skeleton staffs continue to see what voters have to say.




QUESTIONS ABOUT THE TWO REPUBLICAN FRONT-RUNNERS IN IOWA


All polls for several weeks have shown Gov. Mike Huckabee (R-Ark.) and Gov. Mitt Romney (R-Mass.) far ahead of all others in the Republican contest.

Neither is in the top two of immigration-reduction candidates (that would be HUNTER & THOMPSON). But I do rank them No. 3 and No. 5 of the 14.

Immigration has been a hot issue among them, with the two trading charges about each other's weaknesses on the issue.

Many immigration-reduction activists and groups have weighed in with their own interpretations of these two governors' records and their sometimes confusing statements about their immigration positions.

Both Huckabee and Romney have been difficult to rate. Their statements to the media have often been inconsistent and have sometimes sounded contradictory. Neither has taken a public pledge that is iron-clad against any kind of amnesty for illegal aliens.

Nonetheless, we have studied their statements, their websites and their campaign staff's long conversations with us very carefully and come up with the ratings that you will find on the Republican Candidates GRID.

Use that link and click on the photos of the candidates to look at all the specifics that went into their ratings. You can judge for yourself.


ROMNEY -- and Tancredo's endorsement of him


No candidate -- not even Rep. Tom Tancredo -- has beaten the immigration issue drum more loudly or more often than Mitt Romney this past year. He has continually advertised on the issue, particularly pointing out the weak immigration positions of John McCain and Rudy Giuliani. He has raised the issue repeatedly in candidate forums and debates .

Romney deserves as much credit as Tancredo in the fact that immigration is the No. 1 issue among Republican voters in Iowa and one of the top issues for Republican voters nationwide.

He is obviously much, much better than McCain and Giuliani who are terrible on immigration. But there have been lots of doubts among immigration activists about how good he really is on the issue.

The amnesty issue has been the most obviously troubling.

Before talking about just how troubling, I'll note that you will find on the GRID that we now rate his amnesty position as "GOOD." I upgraded it after a long talk with Congressman Tancredo last weekend and after Romney's latest immigration ads stating forcefully his opposition to amnesty in contrast to McCain's positions.

You deserve to know about what Tancredo told me. But first let me talk about why so many people -- including me -- have mistrusted Romney's anti-amnesty commitment.

After stating for months that he is opposed to amnesty, he went on NBC in December and let Tim Russert tie him in knots on the issue. Romney sounded defensive about his positions, as if he didn't really want the elites of the nation to think him hard-hearted enough to send millions of illegal aliens back home. (You can read the transcript of the interview on our Romney page.)

We immediately after that Russert interview knocked Romney's amnesty rating down from "GOOD." Whatever did he mean when he talked about:

MR. ROMNEY: "... the 12 million or so that are here illegally--should be able to stay sign up for permanent residency or citizenship, but they should not be given a special pathway, a special guarantee that all of them get to stay here for the rest of their lives merely by virtue of having come here illegally. And that, I think, is the great flaw in the final bill that came forward from the Senate." < font color=black>

Where do they sign up? And they don't have to go back home? Well, Russert asked that precise question which got a little better answer from Romney.

MR. RUSSERT: "But they shouldn't have to go home?"

GOV. ROMNEY: "Well, whether they go home--they should go home eventually. There's a set per--in my view they should be--they should have a set period during which period they, they sign up for application for permanent residency or, or for citizenship. But there's a set period where upon they should return home. And if they've been approved for citizenship or for a permanent residency, well, thy would be a different matter. But for the great majority, they'll be going home."

MR. RUSSERT: "The children they had born here are U.S. citizens, so do the children stay here and the parents go home?"

GOV. ROMNEY: "Well, that's a choice, of course, the parents would, would make. But my view is that those 12 million who've come here illegally should be given the opportunity to sign up to stay here, but they should not be given any advantage in becoming a permanent resident or citizen by virtue of simply coming here illegally. And likewise, if they've brought a child to this country or they've had a child in this country, that's, that's wonderful that they're growing their families, but that doesn't mean that they all get to stay here indefinitely. We're fundamentally a nation of laws."

Good grief! Good grief! Good grief! If you are going to run on this issue, get it down pat, speak clearly and with conviction, leaving no doubt where you stand. I'm a great lover of nuance in public policy, but .....

Romney's staff -- like the staff of many of the Presidential candidates in recent weeks -- phoned me and tried to explain that the answers to Russert weren't what they sounded like.

I sort of could see what the staffers were saying, but I couldn't buy it. I didn't know what to buy.

Then last weekend, I had my long phone visit with Congressman Tancredo, the man who started before the 9/11 atrocity and stood up and talked day after day, month after month in Washington DC when nobody else would and forced immigration onto the congressional agenda and eventually into the 2008 Presidential races.

I knew that Tancredo would never compromise on immigration. But when he announced his withdrawal from the Presidential race and then gave his endorsement to Romney I wondered if he had been somehow misled.

Here's what Tancredo told me:

Before he gave his endorsement to Romney in Iowa on Dec. 20, 2007, the two met for nearly two hours. The main topic of the conversation was Romney's confusing comments to Russert. Tancredo was drawn to Romney because of the way he had "Tancredoed" the immigration issue throughout the campaign so aggressively, but he had to have some answers.

"I said there is no way I will endorse you unless I get a satisfactory explanation about the Russert interview," Tancredo told me. "I had the transcript in my hand. We went over everything."

Of special concern to Tancredo was this part of Romney's response to Russert: "But my view is that those 12 million who've come here illegally should be given the opportunity to sign up to stay here ... "

"I pushed him hard on the 'to stay here' phrase," Tancredo said.

In the end, Tancredo said he was completely satisfied that Romney's plan was a no-amnesty plan, even though it wasn't exactly the plan he would have.

He said Romney has the idea that if illegal aliens will come forward and sign up they can get a card that will allow them to stay in the country legally for maybe six months, maybe a year, to give them time to wrap up their affairs, let their kids finish the school year and then move themselves and their families back to their home countries.

Everybody has to go home where they can sign up to come back if they otherwise qualif y, according to Tancredo's reporting on Romney, but they can't have any special pathway or extra visas to do so.

All of that meets the definition of "no amnesty" and of "attrition through enforcement" that causes illegal aliens to go home over time, Tancredo felt.

"I told him that in return for my endorsement I didn't want any position in his administration or any nice things said about me or anything at all for myself," Tancredo said. "I said that what I had to have was a 'guarantee on your word' against any kind of amnesty and that the illegal aliens have to go back home. He gave me his word."

It did not sound like Romney gave his word in order to get Tancredo's endorsement but that he gave his word because that was his real stance on amnesty.

On the basis of Tancredo's word and the fact that his account of Romney's explanation also matches what Romney's staffers have been telling me -- and because of Romney's aggressive new anti-amnesty advertising, I've given him a GOOD rating on amnesty, although I would much rather have done so on the basis of simple, unconfused statements directly from the candidate himself. We'll keep watching.


HUCKABEE -- Can his converstion be trusted?


We rate Gov. Huckabee's treatment of immigration issues in Arkansas as "bad."

Yet, I give him an overall "fair" rating on the broad sweep of his immigration promises and actions. And I will not be surprised if he and his campaign make additional promises that warrant a GOOD rating.

That surely gives many of you heartburn, because there is a strong segment of the immigration-reduction movement that simply does not trust Huckabee's conversion into an anti-amnesty, anti-illegal immigration, pro-reductionist candidate.

William Gheen and his ALIPAC organization have rallied other groups and waged a strong campaign on the int ernet and on the ground in Iowa to battle what they feel are Huckabee's intentions for a touch-back amnesty and to question the sincerity of Huckabee's broad immigration plan unveiled just in December.

This kind of pressure has had a keen effect on Huckabee's campaign which has continually toughened its positions on immigration.

On the day of the Iowa Caucuses, I am giving Huckabee these overall ratings:

FAIR - In opposition to amnesty for illegal aliens and a plan for them to go back home without a special path or extra visas to return to the U.S.

GOOD - In having a detailed plan to stop future illegal immigration.

FAIR - In intentions to reduce overall legal immigration to protect American workers and communities from the costs of over-immigration.

BAD - In actual performance concerning immigration as governor.
Please see many more details behind those ratings on the GRID.

http://www.betterimmigration.com/candid ... z2008.html

You will see on our special page on Huckabee some of the interview he had with Fox News that sounded like an endorsement of a touch-back amnesty in which illegal aliens leave the country but are allowed a special path back into the U.S.

Huckabee's staffers offer much the same explanation of his convoluted TV talk as do Romney's staffers. They say he is opposed to a touch-back amnesty and that he only means that if an illegal alien can qualify to come back into the country as a spouse of a U.S. citizen or as a temporary worker on an H-2B or H-2A visa, then they could do so without penalty but through channnels that anybody else in the world would use.

Huckabee has an overall plan for preventing future illegal immigration and driving current illegal aliens out of the country that is excellent in most respects. And he has pledged to end the visa lottery and a considerable part of chain migration.

But his amnesty promises lack the public intensity or clarity -- or a Ta ncredo-like validation -- to warrant anything better than a "fair" rating at this time.


THE RATING THAT MATTERS IS YOURS


In the end the rating that will matter when you vote is your own.

Tancredo said he endorsed Romney as the only candidate good on immigration who looked strong enough to "go the distance" and beat McCain.

But I rate Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) and Sen. Fred Thompson as considerably better on immigration than Romney. That's why Thompson got the endorsement from Iowa's Rep. Steve King, another of the powerful leaders for immigration reduction in the U.S. House.

I hope all the information that our NumbersUSA team has gathered for you on the GRID and Candidates pages will be helpful to you as you decide to vote.

We will continue to modify the GRID as candidates change.

SINCERELY,

Roy Beck

William Gheen and his ALIPAC organization have rallied other groups and waged a strong campaign on the int ernet and on the ground in Iowa to battle what they feel are Huckabee's intentions for a touch-back amnesty and to question the sincerity of Huckabee's broad immigration plan unveiled just in December.

Oh, and here's another:

I have two suggestions for you:

(1) Vote for Sen. Dodd (D-Conn.) and announce that it is simply because he is rated by NumbersUSA as slightly better than the other Democrats on immigration issues. Or ......

(2) Cast your vote for a Democrat not on the ballot -- Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-North Dakota).

Look at Dorgan's record. Since 2001, he has had a B-plus immigration record, and is A-plus in protecting American workers from unfair foreign labor competition. Nobody gave more eloquent speeches this past year on the need to keep immigration in check in order to protect American workers and their families.

Sen. Dorgan isn't running for President, but he is a great choice for casting a symbolic vote to urge the national Democratic Party to reallign itself with Democratic voters on immigration.

Hey, didn't I just say that yesterday or the day before?

Personally, I know Dorgan isn't perfect, and that there are a lot of folks here that wouldn't vote for him based purely on party affiliation, but...
I think he would to a pretty good job as POTUS (hey, compared to the other prospective options... ) and would probably vote for him if he ran.

Reposting a segment of the OP but cleaned up here a bit in the interest of readability:


OVERALL Presidential Candidate Ratings On IMMIGRATION
How Well Would Each Candidate PROTECT Workers, Communities and Taxpayers FROM OVER-IMMIGRATION?
(SEE BELOW FOR HOW POINTS WERE ASSIGNED ON 36-POINT SCALE.)

EXCELLENT

DUNCAN HUNTER (34 points)


GOOD

FRED THOMPSON (28 points)
MITT ROMNEY (22 points)


FAIR

RON PAUL (20 points)
MIKE HUCKABEE (18 points)


POOR

RUDY GIULIANI (8 points)


BAD

CHRIS DODD (7 points)

JOHN McCAIN (5 points)
JOE BIDEN (")
JOHN EDWARDS (")
DENNIS KUCINICH (")
BILL RICHARDSON (")

HILLARY CLINTON (4 points)
BARACK OBAMA (4 points)

====================

HOW POINTS WERE ASSESSED:

Points are based on candidate promises as of 2JAN08 on
(a) amnesty,
(b) stoppping future illegal immigration and
(c) reducing importation of foreign labor competition, plus
(d) rating of past immigration actions in political office.

Roy Beck said that he was going to clarify everything about Romney last week, during one of the radion shows!!

Of special concern to Tancredo was this part of Romney's response to Russert: "But my view is that those 12 million who've come here illegally should be given the opportunity to sign up to stay here ... "

"I pushed him hard on the 'to stay here' phrase," Tancredo said.

In the end, Tancredo said he was completely satisfied that Romney's plan was a no-amnesty plan, even though it wasn't exactly the plan he would have.

He said Romney has the idea that if illegal aliens will come forward and sign up they can get a card that will allow them to stay in the country legally for maybe six months, maybe a year, to give them time to wrap up their affairs, let their kids finish the school year and then move themselves and their families back to their home countries.

Everybody has to go home where they can sign up to come back if they otherwise qualif y, according to Tancredo's reporting on Romney, but they can't have any special pathway or extra visas to do so.

All of that meets the definition of "no amnesty" and of "attrition through enforcement" that causes illegal aliens to go home over time, Tancredo felt.

Originally Posted by Populist

Of special concern to Tancredo was this part of Romney's response to Russert: "But my view is that those 12 million who've come here illegally should be given the opportunity to sign up to stay here ... "

"I pushed him hard on the 'to stay here' phrase," Tancredo said.

In the end, Tancredo said he was completely satisfied that Romney's plan was a no-amnesty plan, even though it wasn't exactly the plan he would have.

He said Romney has the idea that if illegal aliens will come forward and sign up they can get a card that will allow them to stay in the country legally for maybe six months, maybe a year, to give them time to wrap up their affairs, let their kids finish the school year and then move themselves and their families back to their home countries.

Everybody has to go home where they can sign up to come back if they otherwise qualif y, according to Tancredo's reporting on Romney, but they can't have any special pathway or extra visas to do so.

All of that meets the definition of "no amnesty" and of "attrition through enforcement" that causes illegal aliens to go home over time, Tancredo felt.

I really hope I am wrong... I really do because as things sit now, Romney seems like the best(only) choice. He just comes across as a slick car salesman. Something about him just does not site well with me.

Maybe someone can surprise tonight(Iowa)

I think that a lot of people get the wrong impression of Romney because he appears to be so "polished"----knows big words, and can talk in sentences. Unfortunately, this might be because we are so used to Jorge Boosh!!!

We all know Giuliani, Huckabee, McCain would be terrible on this issue, as well as all the Dems. Hunter & Paul don't seem to be moving in the polls. I don't want to get stuck with Hillary v. Giuliani or McCain, that's a lose/lose. I don't know if McCain can win the GOP nim, but he can do damage to make it easier for Giuliani. We don't want that.

Actually I like Romney

He speaks well , he is business smart
I know the Mormon "values" as far as morals
And they are good

I do see Huck as the shyster used car salesman


I just think Romney looks "slick" to some people because
of the fact that Bush has "dumbed down" the office of President