Immigration: The GOP’s new tune

last updated 8 January 2015

The GOP is having a change of heart on immigration, said Susan Milligan in USNews.com. Stung by their drubbing in the 2012 presidential election, Republicans have finally realized that unless they start wooing Hispanic voters, they will “have a very hard time winning another national election.” One of the most dramatic about-faces came from Tea Party darling Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), who last week endorsed a path to legal status for the country’s 11 million undocumented immigrants. Just two years ago, he’d sought to end birthright citizenship for the children of undocumented immigrants. Even if he’s mostly preparing for a 2016 presidential bid, Paul deserves credit for recognizing that Republicans have to steer clear of inflammatory buzzwords like “amnesty” and “self-deportation.” He’s on the right track, said Albert Sabaté in ABCNews.com. A recent poll found that a quarter of Latinos who voted for Obama last year would consider voting Republican “if the party helped to pass immigration reform.”

But backing immigration reform is no ticket to electoral success, said TheWashington Times in an editorial. Of course Republicans have to adapt to the country’s changing demographics. But “that doesn’t necessarily mean they should support putting 11 million illegal immigrants on a path to citizenship.” And let’s not overlook the irony here, said Matthew Cooper in NationalJournal.com. The Republicans’ new tack could end up having the unintended effect of delivering millions of new voters to their opponents. Republicans like to believe that Hispanics lean conservative, with a devotion to family and hard work. But on issues like gay rights, health care, and the economy, Hispanics tend to “stand with the Democrats.” The GOP will have to change its tune on more than just immigration to win over America’s fastest-growing demographic bloc.

It’s no surprise that the GOP would love to shed its anti-immigrant label, said Greg Sargent in WashingtonPost.com. But there’s far less to this attempted political makeover than meets the eye. Many rank-and-file Republicans remain deeply ambivalent about backing any proposal that gives undocumented immigrants legal status, much less citizenship, for fear of antagonizing the party’s traditional white male base. Look closely and you’ll see what immigration advocate Frank Sharry sees: that Republicans are just trying to “make it look as if they’re being nice to Latinos even as they make the path to citizenship long, hard, or even unattainable.”