Republicans On Immigration

Tonight the Republican presidential candidates are going to be arguing over immigration in a debate sponsored by Univision.

Republican presidential candidates will try to woo one of their most disenchanted voting blocs Sunday in a debate that will be translated simultaneously into the language of persuasion: Spanish.

Broadcast live from the University of Miami by the Univision network, the debate marks the first time the Republican field will participate in a televised forum directed at a Spanish-speaking audience.

It will be interesting to see how the candidates walk their way through the long and winding minefield. At the same time, they will have to acknowledge the increasingly unforgiving mood of the general public towards illegal immigration, the apparent divergence between non-Hispanics and Hispanics on this issue, and the fact that (for most candidates) their current positions on illegal immigration seem at odds with positions taken just a few months ago.

This debate may be almost as fun to watch as the Patriots-Steelers game that precedes it.

Comments

[MDT]

This says it all without watching another debate-

http://www.betterimmigration.com/candidates/2006/prez08_gop1.html

[Peter Schaeffer]

The Center for Immigration Studies published detailed polling data on the Senate immigration bill of 2006. The data is broken down by sex, race, and religion. Looking at the data the Hispanic community divided evenly (roughly) over immigration. The rest of the country is not. Born-again Protestants are consistently the most restrictionist group.

The data can be found at “New Poll: Americans Prefer House
Approach on Immigration” (http://www.cis.org/articles/2006/2006poll.html)

[Peter Schaeffer]

Professor Borjas,

In a prior post, you decried the fierce indoctrination and climate of intolerance you found in Cuba’s schools as a child. You mentioned, that in Florida “the entire school day was instead spent talking about the upcoming football game”. I note your comment

“This debate may be almost as fun to watch as the Patriots-Steelers game that precedes it.”

Perhaps our version is just more subtle?

[Coyote99]

What was the purpose of having this debate telecast in Spanish? If the targeted debate audience was U.S. Hispanic citizens, why telecast in Spanish? After all, to become a U.S. citizen, the foreign applicant must demonstrate English proficiency. And as the MSM is always telling us, Hispanic immigrants WANT to assimilate and become good Americans, right? So why are we broadcasting to them in Spanish? Only U.S. citizens are (legally) eligible to vote in U.S. presidential elections, so surely this broadcast was not aimed at any Hispanic population living illegally in the U.S. or planning to vote illegally in our elections, right?

So what's next? Are there going to be presidential debates aimed at Chinese-Americans telecast in Mandarin? Or debates targeted at Arab-Americans telecast in Arabic? Hard to imagine, isn't it? But we seem to have a very different standard when it comes to Hispanics.

I'm beginning to think Tom Tancredo had the right idea when he boycotted the Spanish-language debate. There simply is no justification for it.

[MDT]

Enjoy this one
http://teamtancredo.typepad.com/team_tancredo/2007/12/new-tancredo-we.html#comments

[Dee]

Republicans participated in this debate because, as the article states: "Among Hispanic voters, allegiance to the Republican Party is declining" and the Republicans want to change this. Why in Spanish? Univision is a Spanish station, so of course it was broadcast in Spanish.

For decades and decades: 1.Hispanic communities have always spoken Spanish.
2. Immigration Laws were unenforced.
3. The Administration waived illegal status and asked migrant laborers to help rebuild New Orleans and the Southwest.

On the other side of the coin, John Tanton began his Immigration tirades in the 70´s. He recruited people like Bob Beck, Ira Mehlman, Pat and Bay Buchanan and formed FAIR, NumbersUSA, Pro America PAC, You Don´t Speak for Me, Black Americans against Illegal Immigration, etc. He partnered with Englishman Peter Brimelow (VDare), and worked with the Minutemen MDMC leaders (Gilchrist Simcox) and Tancredo to get his message out. It has only been since 9-11, where he capitalized on the fear of the American Public to gain their support and all his efforts have gained momentum to its current state.

[D Flinchum]

"The Administration waived illegal status and asked migrant laborers to help rebuild New Orleans and the Southwest."

What actually happened is that US citizens were FIRED from jobs rebuilding New Orleans after being told that "the Mexiican have arrived and they'll work for less."

John Tanton is a dedicated environmentalist who refuses to embrace the politically correct notion of massive immigration because he, like most true environmentalists, knows that the increase in population caused mainly by massive immigration and the descendants of these immigrants is destroying the US environmentally.

As I have noted before, in 1986, I fully supported the amnesty - and it was called that back then - that was passed that year. I later discovered that the federal government and the biz intersts had no intentions of upholding their part of the law: enforcement. I became a restrictionist before 9/11, primarily as a result of my environmentalism, but I'll admit that 9/11 added more force to my beliefs.

What has happened is that massive immigration, especially the illegal kind in which anybody who wants to just shows up, has finally succeeded in infuriating the usually tolerant US people. They want it stopped.

Good for them!

[MDT]

"What has happened is that massive immigration, especially the illegal kind in which anybody who wants to just shows up, has finally succeeded in infuriating the usually tolerant US people. They want it stopped."

That's exactly right, I have never been so upset with the state of affairs as now. I see it as the end of everything I came to this country for. See this poll-

http://www.alipac.us/article-2769-thread-1-0.html

[MDT]

Dee
You are just a mouthpiece and a sloganeer with no original reasoned arguments or facts anywhere. It's all empty rhetoric.

[Dee]

MDT and D Flinchum,
Many Americans disagree with your anger and your perspective regarding this issue. We understand the history of immigration and how this is more of an economic issue. In fact, I´ve written about this in detail on my blog.
http://immigrationmexicanamerican.blogspot.com/2007/12/its-not-illegal-immigration-its-economy.html

I know and understand nothing anyone says will stop your anger and you will continue to not listen to anyone elses perspective. I believe that is unfortunate for all of us.

[D Flinchum]

Dee, I have read extensively both pro and con on the immigration issue for years. I have sifted facts and come to the conclusion that the massive immigration that we are now seeing - both legal and illegal - is bad for the average US citizen whatever his/her race, creed, or ethnic make-up may be. It isn't an issue of anger; it's an issue of understanding what it all means.

Some of the most ignorant people on this issue, I have found, are the Pollyannas who haven't thought through what adding 200 million people to the US population in the next 50 years will mean.

They rant and rave about global warming (a real problem), loss of farm land and open space, lack of water, and general deterioration of quality of life and then totally ignore the part that over-population in the US plays in these areas. It's as if a man smoked 3 packs of unfiltered Camels a day, lived on fast food, and drank a case of beer a day and then was astounded that his health took a beating.

What those who think as I do need to do is to keep making sure that the word gets out and keeping more and more people "angry". That is what kept amnesty for being passed in 2007.

[MDT]

Well said. And I can vouch for the terrible consequences of overpopulation personally, having immigrated from one of the overpopulated countries many years back. Would not want to see it all replicated here.

The book by Lindsey Grant is very instructive and prescient on this topic.

[Peter Schaeffer]

Dee,

Sure the economy acounts for some of the concern about immigration (legal and illegal). However, a significant fraction of what is wrong with the economy is accounted for by mass immigration.

If we stopped mass immigration after 2000, median family income wouldn't be lower now, than it was then. Black family incomes wouldn't have declined 8%. Hispanic family incomes wouldn't have gone now (by a lesser amount).

Did you know that Hispanic immigrant in Los Angeles are earning far lower wages today, than they were a generation ago? Is that your idea of progress?

Any number of studies have shown large scale displacement of native workers since 2000. I know of at least three.

The problems caused by mass immigration are serious. Pointing to the economy only demonstrates how the real problems of the economy and mass immigration can't be separated.

Even if they could be, what is wrong with a nation addressing dire problems as a consequence of a downturn? The New Deal brought a great many new public policies. Should we repeal the laws that created the SEC, FCC, FDIC, and Social Security because they were passed in the Depression?

9-11 defintely played a roll in raising public concern about immigration. So did Pearl Harbor (which killed fewer people) in waking up an earlier generation of Americans.

[steven]

Of course, the current immigration policies push down the wages of unskilled American Citizens. Especially hard hit are african american and latino American citizens.

this is not a racial issue.

However, if prominent african american US citizens and latino US citizens were loud and prominent - if they were up front about being against unskilled immigration - it would greatly advance the cause.

Are there any super prominent well known african americans and latino americans today campaigning against the amnesty?

We need them