Bloomberg
By Heidi Przybyla
November 12, 2014
Republicans are warning President Barack Obama that
he’ll poison relations with Congress if he takes executive action to
ease U.S. immigration laws. For Obama, it’s a risk worth taking.
By delaying deportation for some undocumented
workers, as he’s expected to do, the president would solidify his
support among Hispanics, the nation’s largest minority group. At the
same time, he’d force Republicans into a divisive debate
that may alienate those crucial voters before the 2016 elections.
Republicans are split, with some who say the party
must take steps to temper its stance against undocumented immigrants and
others who consider them lawbreakers who don’t deserve what many label
amnesty. Any move by Obama would put that
dispute on public display in a way that could be damaging to
Republicans.
“The right wing will go nuts,” said Fergus Cullen, a
former New Hampshire Republican Party chairman who recently spoke with
House Speaker John Boehner on immigration.
And there isn’t much Republicans can do about it.
If Obama’s action sours the climate for legislative compromise --
including on other issues like infrastructure spending and health care
-- Republicans will bear much of the blame as they’ll
soon have majority control of Congress.
Obama has vowed to act before the end of the year,
though the White House won’t say what his executive order will entail.
Among other measures, it could include halting deportations of the
parents of children brought to the U.S. illegally.
Or it may be broader, covering many of the 11 million people included
in a bill passed in June 2013 by the Democratic-led Senate.
Critical Bloc
National demographic shifts, particularly in
competitive states such as Nevada and Florida, make the support of
Hispanic voters critical to both political parties.
Obama -- who won 71 percent of the vote of Latinos
in 2012 -- disappointed them in September by holding off on plans to
delay deportation of some undocumented workers. His goal was to protect
Democrats such as Senator Mark Pryor of Arkansas
who were facing close elections in Republican-leaning states.
Now, those Democrats have lost their elections and
the politics of the immigration issue have been transformed, with
Republicans winning control of both chambers.
A number of newly elected Republicans, including
Tom Cotton of Arkansas and Joni Ernst of Iowa, will come to the Senate
on a campaign pledge to crack down on what they say is amnesty for
illegal immigrants.
2016 Election
While that message helped energize voters in those
states, it risks undermining a Republican Party that wants to reclaim
the White House and is facing Senate battles in 2016 that will be fought
on less friendly territory, including in Democratic-leaning
Illinois and Pennsylvania.
“There’s a tremendous amount of fear among
Republican leaders,” said David Johnson, a party strategist who worked
on former Senator Bob Dole’s 1988 presidential bid.
Vulnerable Republicans and presidential aspirants
will come under pressure from the party’s base to push back, including
with border-security measures, or be bludgeoned by primary challengers,
Johnson said.
At the same time, “if they alienate the Latino vote
in pivotal states like Nevada, they can kiss away their majority and
any hopes of gaining the White House” in 2016, he said.
That partly explains the heated Republican rhetoric about Obama’s plans to issue executive orders.
Poisoning Well
Boehner, an Ohio Republican, has warned that action
by the president would invite “big trouble” and “poison the well” with
Congress. Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, who is poised to become
majority leader, likened it to “waving a red
flag in front of a bull.”
Senator John Barrasso of Wyoming said such a move would be akin to “pulling the pin out of a hand grenade.”
Others, including Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, have
suggested they might be willing to shut down the government over the
issue, threatening to block presidential action.
“If you thought Obamacare was divisive,”
Representative Mario Diaz-Balart said in an interview, “this has the
potential to really just tear the country apart.” The Florida Republican
was among a bipartisan group of House lawmakers on the
cusp of an immigration deal this year before a surge of Central
American children on the U.S.-Mexico border halted their efforts.
The dire warnings have done little to change
Obama’s determination to act, which he doubled down on last week in a
White House meeting with congressional leaders.
Obama is also facing demands from the Democratic
Party’s base of pro-immigration activists, who were outspoken in their
anger over his decision to delay executive orders until after the Nov. 4
election.
Walking Tightrope
Republicans have been walking a tightrope on the immigration issue for several years.
The Senate bill passed last year includes a path to
citizenship for undocumented workers. Boehner has refused to bring it
up for a vote, worried it would split the party and provoke a challenge
from Tea Party-aligned members.
His concerns were underscored by then-House
Majority Leader Eric Cantor’s stunning defeat in a June Virginia primary
by Tea Party favorite Dave Brat. Brat hammered Cantor in the final
weeks of the campaign for backing amnesty, which Cantor
denied was his position. His defeat signaled the end of the House’s
attempts at comprehensive immigration legislation.
Instead, the House has passed piecemeal bills that
would enhance border security, bolster an agricultural guest-worker
program, increase the number of visas for high-skilled workers, and
require employers to start using an e-verify system.
The Senate hasn’t taken them up, with Democratic leaders saying they’ve
already passed broad legislation.
Boehner’s Request
Now, Boehner is asking Obama to hold off on his
executive orders so the new Congress can again address immigration
legislatively.
“Boehner wants to do something on immigration; we
have four bills that made it through the House,” Representative Tom Cole
of Oklahoma, a Republican ally of the speaker, said in an interview.
The Obama administration doesn’t agree that the politics within the Republican Party have changed.
During an interview with Bloomberg News reporters
and editors last week, White House aide Dan Pfeiffer noted that Boehner,
in a news conference, was unwilling to pledge that he would allow a
vote on a bigger immigration bill even if the
president agreed to another delay.
Meanwhile, the political peril of executive action for Republicans is clear.
Forcing a congressional immigration debate will put
the party on the spot while giving a bigger megaphone to lawmakers such
as Representative Steve King of Iowa.
King has drawn rebukes for saying many undocumented
aliens had “calves the size of cantaloupes because they’re hauling 75
pounds of marijuana across the desert.” He also once called for an
electrified fence along the Mexican border.
“Steve King cannot be the face and voice of the
Republican Party on immigration issues if the party is going to prosper
in national elections,” Cullen said.
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