04/03/13 Update: Lamar Smith’s office has announced that he plans to keep using the term “illegal immigrant”–”and trusts the the AP will keep quoting people who do so as well.” Immigration activists and advocates yesterday were abuzz with excitement when the Associated Press announced it was dropping the use of the term “illegal immigrant.”  The change comes [...]
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04/03/13 Appearing on Sean Hannity’s radio show earlier this week, Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) stated: I think the reason that President Obama is insisting on a path to citizenship is that it is designed to be a poison pill to scuttle the whole bill, so he can have a political issue in 2014 and 2016.  I [...]
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03/29/13 Update: Young has issued a full apology: “I apologize for the insensitive term I used during an interview in Ketchikan, Alaska. There was no malice in my heart or intent to offend; it was a poor choice of words. That word, and the negative attitudes that come with it, should be left in the 20th century, [...]
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03/28/13 Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) is at it again—apparently making up Texas friends with property overrun by border crossers. During an appearance on a Texas radio show this morning, Cornyn claimed that people all over the world are now crossing the border through Texas and that any immigration reform that Congress passes this year must invest [...]
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03/21/13 Mark Krikorian, head of the anti-immigrant “think tank” Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), is feeling a bit lonely this week.  Surveying the likely GOP presidential contenders for 2016, he lamented to the conservative Weekly Standard, “I’m honestly looking for someone I can support in 2016.”  Krikorian’s glum assessment of the potential 2016 Republican presidential field is due to the [...]
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03/21/13 Flip back the count.  It’s been zero days since Congressional Republicans last called a CIS witness to a hearing. All over Washington, Republicans are deciding that getting with the program on immigration reform and shutting up about their nativist tendencies is the best way to go.  The RNC released a whole report that talks about [...]
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03/19/13 Surprise, surprise.  Republicans who don’t want immigration reform to pass are now trying to “slow down” the process by complaining that the debate is moving too fast. Here’s what that really means: Republican Sens. Chuck Grassley (R-IA), Orrin Hatch (R-UT), Jeff Sessions (R-AL), John Cornyn (R-TX), Mike Lee (R-UT), and Ted Cruz (R-TX)–are trying to stop [...]
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03/18/13 The Republican National Committee took a serious step toward reclaiming its big-tent-party status today, when it announced that it will spend millions this year on minority outreach and endorsed comprehensive immigration reform.  It was a move toward reason and rationality, and a tiny hint that Republicans might be willing to make things work in Washington, [...]
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03/18/13 You can’t make this stuff up. Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) has been living in his anti-immigrant bubble for so long, he has no idea how much the world has changed. Further proof was provided today. On the very day that the Republican National Committee tried to distance itself from its anti-immigrant record, Senator Jefferson Beauregard [...]
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03/18/13 Just one more thing about the CPAC conference that took place this last weekend: on Saturday, conservative commentator Ann Coulter made an appearance that Politico called “a stand-up comedy routine more than a speech,” in which she attacked Marco Rubio and other Republicans for supporting immigration reform.  As Coulter said: If amnesty goes through, America [...]
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03/12/13 Yesterday we wrote a blog post about a Tanton network hate group, the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) attacking the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), a civil rights organization, for hating on them.  Today another Tanton network extremist group, the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), has put out a whole report attacking the New [...]
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03/11/13 Over the weekend, Fox New’s Laura Ingraham brought on Bob Dane, a spokesman for the Federation of American Immigration Reform (FAIR, considered to be a hate group), to slam the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) and pretend that hate groups don’t exist. “There’s a legal definition as to what a hate crime is,” Dane said, [...]
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03/06/13 Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) has an imaginary friend—and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee wants everyone to know it. A few weeks ago, Cornyn tweeted about a “friend” of his who said that “300 ppl” were coming across his property every night: Friend on border sez 300 ppl coming across his property every night.And Napolitano sez [...]
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03/06/13 The power of immigration reform WITH a path to citizenship is on full display this week, continuing to hammer down Jeb Bush days after his book revealed that he no longer believed a path was necessary.  Instead of using his position to bring Republicans into the immigration debate, as he’d hoped, Bush is now struggling [...]
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03/05/13 Last month we brought to you the story of Jessica Bravo and anti-immigrant super-hardliner Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA).  When Jessica, a DREAMer, came to Rohrabacher’s office to ask him to support immigration reform, he screamed at her that he “hate[s] illegals” and told her “now I know where you live.” The story of the sitting [...]
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03/04/13 The pro-immigration reform movement has long been familiar with the Tanton network, a body of anti-immigrant organizations (some considered to be hate groups) all founded by a single man—John Tanton.  Tanton was associated with white supremacists and eugenicists, corresponding with Ku Klux Klan lawyers and writing screeds like about how a “European-American society and culture to persist [...]
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03/01/13 Update: Apparently Glenn Beck is taking issue with the Colter character expressing anti-immigrant sentiments that make the Tea Party look bad, even though Colter has only used language that would be right at home on Beck’s radio show or Fox News. As Media Matters wrote last week: Beck targeted the Colter character on his radio show, arguing that [...]
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02/25/13 Happening in the U.S. House of Representatives this week are not one, not two, but three subcommittee hearings on immigration-related topics, spanned across two different committees (Homeland Security and Judiciary). All House Committees are, of course, currently controlled by Republicans.  Unlike the hearings of the last few weeks, these next three will not be full committee [...]
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02/22/13 Yesterday was a good day for immigration reform prospects, as the AFL/CIO and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce released a set of shared principles that generated praise and optimism from observers ranging from White House press secretary Jay Carney to House Majority Whip Eric Cantor (R-VA). However, House Judiciary Committee Chair Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) seems intent to step all over the [...]
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02/21/13 “The only thing that stops them, and I’m afraid to say but it’s too damn bad, but is a gun.  That’s all that will stop them,” said one.  “Cut off their welfare and their stuff and they’ll go back!” another said. These are just a few choice quotes shouted by anti-immigrant die-hards at a recent [...]
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02/21/13 While cable news channels have been in its usual hysterics over a few hard-core anti-immigrant cranks showing up at a Senator John McCain town hall meeting this week, the person most unbothered by those cranks has been Senator John McCain himself.  He dismissed the confrontation as a normal event, saying “I’ve done town halls for [...]
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02/19/13 When the extremist position you espouse is only held by 17% of Americans, perhaps it’s not such a good idea to call for a nationwide protest composed of 50 different events supposedly showcasing how strong your movement is. Americans for Legal Immigration (ALIPAC), a stridently anti-immigrant group, called for a national day of protest against [...]
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02/19/13 Oh, boy. Writing from his perch at National Review, Mark Krikorian, the Executive Director of the anti-immigrant “think tank” Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), is having a bit of a melt-down. He’s accusing everyone on all sides of the political spectrum of ganging up on him and his fellow anti-immigrant zealots from the John Tanton [...]
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02/15/13 Last week a member of Congress — Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) —  harassed, screamed at, and threatened an 18-year-old DREAMer who was visiting him with her faith-based community group. Jessica Bravo just wanted to talk to her representative like any other constituent. But when she mentioned her undocumented status, Rohrabacher let loose — yelling about [...]
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02/15/13 Yesterday, we wrote about the story of Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) and how he screamed at and threatened an 18-year-old DREAMer who came to speak to him about immigration reform.  Today, we wanted to bring you a post from the DREAMer herself, Jessica Bravo of Costa Mesa, California.  Her story is a powerful rejoinder to [...]
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02/14/13 Yesterday, the Senate Judiciary Committee held its first hearing on immigration reform. We’ve noted many times that the momentum is on our side. The 2012 elections changed the game on this issue. Our press release from earlier today title,d On Immigration Reform, The Tide Has Turned, makes four key points: The Pro-Reform Side is Strong, Growing, and [...]
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02/14/13 Ugly story in The Hill today about a confrontation between Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) and a DREAMer from California, Jessica Bravo: A conservative congressman got into a heated exchange over immigration last week with one of his constituents who is living in the country illegally. Two very different accounts have emerged from the Feb. 6 meeting [...]
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