Voters handed us a much changed Congress for immigration. NumbersUSA lost and kept some great allies. And voters replaced some F-graders with new allies. How this all shakes out over the next two years still remains to be seen. Here are some initial thoughts.
With all the sensational campaign coverage of immigration issues this month, NumbersUSA commissioned Pulse Opinion Research to find out how those issues are affecting the views of likely midterm voters in congressional districts with the closest races. Those are the races that will determine which Party controls the U.S. House of Representatives.
Since it was reported yesterday morning that Pres. Trump plans to end the practice of granting automatic citizenship to all children born in the United States regardless of the parents' immigration status, most, if not all, mainstream publications have run op-eds explaining why such a move would be unconstitutional. But the writers of these op-eds are missing (or intentionally avoiding) the ways that Pres. Trump could end Birthright Citizenship.
The closest races for the U.S. House of Representatives include 16 with a candidate committed to lower immigration who is competing with a candidate who is not. Most of these 16 -- who are as likely to lose as to win -- are incumbents with good reduction records in Congress.
A memo from the Center for American Progress warns vulnerable Democrats to spend "as little time as possible" talking about immigration. Will open borders prove a bigger albatross than family separations? The last twelve months of immigration punditry provides some clues.
Christopher Browning, a professor of German history, published a long essay in The New York Review of Books. The topic wasn't a book review but a vituperative attack on President Trump, including a denunciation of those, Trump supporters or not, who seek to restrict immigration. It is shockingly shoddy work by someone of Browning's stature, and any effect it may have will only serve to inflame political passions.
E-Verify is an obvious solution to the jobs magnet that Congress and the White House have declined to advance. Ending the catch-and-release policies that encourage illegal immigration is a bit more complicated.
NPR's Ailsa Chang has a wild story about a man who found his American dream writing fictional stories for asylum applicants. Years after being caught, he is in hiding from the FBI but sharing some of his best work with NPR over Skype.