Here We Go....There's A Senate Immigration Reform "Gang"

Whenever you hear about a "A Bi-partisan Senate Gang of X" you can be sure of one thing, Republicans are about to get screwed.

Also included in the new Senate group are Schumer, who chairs the key Senate subcommittee where legislative action will begin; Graham; Robert Menendez (D-N.J.); and Marco Rubio (R-Fla.). Two others, Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) and Michael F. Bennet (D-Colo.), have also been involved in some talks.

Their timetable would aim for a bill to be written by March or April and potentially considered for final passage in the Senate as early as the summer. Proponents believe adoption in the GOP-held House would be made easier with a strong bipartisan vote in the Senate.

Naturally all the usual stuff is on the menu, "guest worker" visa and amnesty of one sort of another naturally topping the list.

Just a reminder Hispanics who we are endlessly told are "natural Republicans and conservatives" have NEVER voted for Republicans as a bloc. The challenge for the GOP now isn't that it isn't getting more or less the same share of the Hispanic vote, it's that Hispanics are increasing as a percentage of voters.

I'm still unclear on how making more of something (in this case legal voters of Hispanic origin) will lead to Republican gains with that cohort.

There are certainly other reasons to support amnesty but amnesty supporters withing the GOP/conservative movement don't seem to be making them. They mostly rely on the fanciful notion that amnesty will miraculously lead to gains for the GOP. The history of the 1986 amnesty says otherwise.

The bigger question is why in the fallout of an electoral drubbing and internal fights over the various fiscal fights in Congress the GOP would willing take on a divisive issue like immigration.

It boggles the mind that supposed party "leaders" are ready to pitch a wounded party into yet another major internal fight.

(For the record using the term "Hispanic" is wildly inaccurate since there are major cultural and political differences between many groups caught up in that catchall term. Still, it's the one that's used in the debate so we're stuck using it.)

posted by DrewM. at 02:54 PM

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