05/10/13 Virtually all of the GOP’s top-tier potential candidates for president in 2016—Marco Rubio, Paul Ryan, Jeb Bush, Rand Paul—are supporters of immigration reform.  For whoever runs, Florida will be a crucial, must-win state.  And Florida supports immigration reform too. A new poll released this week by the Public Policy Institute, and commissioned by the Florida [...]
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05/03/13 Cross-posted at Latino Decisions, Latino Vote Matters, and Daily Kos: Recent elections demonstrate that immigration is a mobilizing issue for Latino voters. We can be sure that Congressional action, or inaction, on the current comprehensive immigration reform (CIR) bill will factor in to Latino voting decisions in 2014 and beyond. Our recent polling finds a majority of Latino voters, 58%, cite [...]
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05/02/13 Yesterday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid appeared at an immigration reform rally in Las Vegas. He has for years been an outspoken advocate for immigration reform – and made that clear again yesterday: Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., promised Wednesday to use the power of his office to get immigration overhaul legislation through Congress. “I pledge [...]
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05/01/13 One desperate tactic in the playbook of those who oppose immigration reform has been to try and split the coalition of supporters, by pitting immigrants and African Americans against each other.  Nativists have tried time and time again to paint the specter of immigrants taking jobs away from African Americans, despite high-profile leaders like the [...]
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05/01/13 Yesterday, Senator John McCain (R-AZ) stated that the best arguments to convince his Republican colleagues to support immigration reform were political in nature: “if we don’t do this, we can’t begin the conversation with our Hispanic voters, and all you have to do is the math.  Do the math on the growth of the Hispanic [...]
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04/29/13 The immigration world is still waiting to see what House Republicans will do with an immigration bill on their side of the Hill, and Judiciary Committee chair Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) has already indicated that he wants to move House legislation in pieces.  Greg Sargent writes in the Washington Post today about the motives behind [...]
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04/26/13 Cross-posted at Burnt Orange Report If there’s such a thing as a GOP demographic doomsday clock, it’s ticking down to the day when Latino voters turn Texas blue and the Republicans cease winning national elections.  A new post at The Hill from columnist Brent Budowksy argues that that day will come much, much sooner if [...]
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04/25/13 The Senate Gang of 8 immigration bill has been released, a number of hearings have been held, and markup is scheduled to start in a few weeks.  Meanwhile, the strength of the pro-immigration reform movement continues to demonstrate its power–and the movement is growing every day. This morning, Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax Reform–who [...]
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04/23/13 Pinging around the blogosphere today has been a Politico article claiming that immigration reform could be a “bonanza” for Democrats, considering that reform could eventually lead to more Hispanic voters, who voted Democratic by a 3-1 margin in the last election.  As the article breathlessly wrote about current undocumented immigrants (right before they noted that [...]
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04/11/13 The following is a press release from the New Democrat Coalition: Today, New Democrat Coalition Chair Ron Kind (WI-03), Vice Chair Rep. Rick Larsen (WA-02), Immigration Task Force Chairs Reps. Jared Polis (CO-02), Joaquin Castro (TX-20), and Joe Garcia (FL-26), and other New Dem Members released a framework for Comprehensive Immigration Reform designed to build [...]
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04/11/13 New polling from NBC News/Wall Street Journal underscores the fact that an earned path to citizenship is the mainstream position in the immigration debate.  Additionally, yesterday’s jubilant rally on the Capitol lawn demonstrates that the energy and enthusiasm in the debate is also on the side of citizenship. According to Frank Sharry, Executive Director of America’s Voice [...]
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04/11/13 You’ve heard us say many times that when it comes to immigration reform with a path to citizenship: the American people want it, Democrats promised it and Republicans need it. Today, we get conclusive proof from the latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll that the American people — including Republicans — do want citizenship for the [...]
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04/02/13 Yesterday, TPM’s Benjy Sarlin took a closer look at Senator Marco Rubio’s latest delaying tactic on immigration: You’d expect Sen. Marco Rubio to be elated by the news over the weekend that labor and business groups reached a deal on a guest worker program, given that he’d identified their slow progress as one of the [...]
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04/02/13 Two Republican Senators playing influential roles in the immigration debate are demonstrating contrasting profiles in leadership this week.  Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC), who is up for re-election in 2014 in one of the most conservative states in the nation, responded to the possibility of ads being run against him on immigration by noting, “If you want [...]
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03/28/13 Yesterday on Univision, Maria Elena Salinas interviewed Republican Rosario Marin, a former US Treasurer, about her thoughts on prospective immigration reform.  Marin was fairly pessimistic, expressing concerns that Obama is using immigration as a political issue rather than really being serious about pushing it through (a favorite argument of Ted Cruz) and worrying that union [...]
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03/21/13 Cross-posted at Latino Decisions Recently there have been a series of high profile endorsements for comprehensive immigration reform from the Republican Party. Immediately after the November 2012 election Bobby Jindal made a plea for more civility and and less stupidity on the immigration issue. Before too long, it was the Gang of 8 in the U.S. Senate which included four [...]
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03/18/13 According to a new Republican National Committee (RNC) analysis of the Party’s shortcomings in recent elections, the GOP’s embrace of hardline anti-immigrant policies is at the heart of their problems with Latino voters.  And as a new Latino Decisions poll makes clear, if the GOP successfully changes its position on the issue, the Party has [...]
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03/18/13 A new Republican National Committee (RNC) analysis of the Party’s shortcomings makes clear that the GOP’s recent embrace of hardline anti-immigrant policies is at the heart of their problems with Latino voters. The new RNC analysis states, “We must embrace and champion comprehensive immigration reform,” and notes that “If Hispanic Americans perceive that a GOP nominee or candidate [...]
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03/14/13 As the Associated Press reported yesterday, “President Barack Obama told House Republicans Wednesday that they would benefit politically more than Democrats would from supporting a comprehensive immigration overhaul, lawmakers present said … The assertion prompted some ‘light chuckles’ from certain Republican members, while others reacted more like Rep. Peter King (R-NY), who said, ‘There’s something to it.’” As  Lynn Tramonte, [...]
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03/13/13 Since the 2012 election, a key political topic has been the Latino vote and how the GOP’s inability to court it could doom them in future elections.  Texas is a crucial factor in this calculation, as a longtime red state that saw a 38% growth in eligible Latino voters between 2000-2010 and whose electorate is [...]
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03/07/13 This week, Mitt Romney returned to national attention with an interview on “Fox News Sunday”—his first public appearance since the 2012 election, and instantly made it clear that with him, nothing has changed. The man who promised to veto the DREAM Act, advocated for self-deportation, brought immigration advisors like Kris Kobach onboard, lost the Latino [...]
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03/06/13 Editor’s note: This column by Maribel Hastings was originally published in Spanish at La Opinion and Huffington Post Voces. The Spanish language version can be viewed here. WASHINGTON, DC – In an interview on NBC’s Today Show Monday, former Florida governor Jeb Bush said it’s premature to declare whether he’ll aspire to the Republican presidential nomination [...]
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03/06/13 Guest-posted at Latino Decisions. A new Latino Decisions poll finds that Latino voters are paying very close attention to the immigration debate in Congress and that a candidate’s stance on immigration policy will directly effect how many Latino votes they win or lose.  The new poll of 800 Latino registered voters nationwide was conducted in [...]
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03/05/13 The 2012 election was a game changer for immigration reform, and thanks to unprecedented Latino turnout and a recognition by both political parties of their growing political power, the prospects for enacting bipartisan immigration reform have never been stronger. On a press call and webinar today, Latino Decisions along with national immigration, Latino and labor [...]
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03/05/13 One of the most interesting angles in the Jeb Bush reversal on citizenship this week has been his fellow Floridian (and 2016 rival) Sen. Marco Rubio’s response.  Rubio predicted to Talking Points Memo today that Bush would eventually swing back to his traditional support for citizenship, given his long history in favor.  Rubio said that [...]
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03/05/13 It is safe to say that Day One of the immigration book media tour for former Florida Governor Jeb Bush did not go exactly as planned.  Numerous observers condemned Gov. Bush for walking back on his past support for citizenship and called it a politically damaging flip-flop. Today, Gov. Bush said he would support an earned citizenship provision, provided that [...]
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03/04/13 Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) appeared on Telemundo’s Enfoque with Jose Diaz-Balart this weekend to talk about politics, the sequester, and immigration reform.  Warner is a moderate Democratic Senator who is up for reelection in 2014. Warner has made it clear he supports immigration reform and recently invited a DREAMer to be his guest at President Obama’s State [...]
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