What Arizona Teaches Us (but not Rand) About Politics of Illegal Immigration

[Agorism]

http://www.redstate.com/2012/11/13/what-arizona-teaches-us-about-politics-of-illegal-immigration


http://www3.pictures.zimbio.com/gi/Lindsey+Graham+Rand+Paul+zTS7407Paq4m.jpg


If you only listened to the media and Republican consultants during the days following the election, you would hear the following erroneous premises about the Hispanic vote and the issue of illegal immigration.


1) Our opposition to the circuitous cycle of amnesty and open borders is the sole reason why we are losing the Hispanic vote.

2) Immediate and unconditional support for illegal immigrants will win us back those votes.

3) An aggressive campaign for their vote on social issues will not help win them over.

4) We would somehow be able to get to the left of Democrats on the issue without encouraging a bidding war (Democrats: “We’ll allow for chain migration of all your relatives.”)

Aside for the fact that these assertions are far from being inviolable truths, there is one other point that has been overlooked throughout the entire post-election debate: the other 90% of the electorate.

Obama ran a wedge-issue campaign in which he used illegal immigration to galvanize Hispanic turnout at the ballot box. But wedge issues cut both ways. While Obama can use them to make gains with some demographics, he should lose at least as many with the rest of the electorate. However, Republicans never rubbed the issue back in his nose. Hence, Obama enjoyed the gain of employing wedge issue attacks without incurring the loss. That is…except for one state.

Do you know what percentage of the electorate in Colorado was Hispanic? 14%.

Virginia? 5%.

Ohio? 3%.

Florida? 17%.

What about Arizona? 18% – up from 16% four years ago!

If there’s any state where illegal immigration should be sinking Republicans it’s Arizona. If you believe the media, Jan Brewer cooks Hispanic kids for dinner, and SB 1070 forces police to randomly lock up any remotely Hispanic looking pedestrian. Yet, Obama has thus far underperformed John Kerry’s showing in the state, even though Kerry ran against George Bush, the champion of GOP Hispanic performance. In fact, Romney’s 10+ point victory in the state is the strongest showing since George H. W. Bush’s 1988 landslide.

So Arizona had a larger share of Hispanic voters than Colorado or Florida, and almost as much as Nevada (19%), yet Romney overperformed. Why?

Well, he received 25% of the Hispanic vote, only slightly below his national average. Incidentally, Jan Brewer received 28% in 2010. But here’s the kicker: Romney blew out the white vote by a whopping 34 points! There wasn’t even much of a gender gap; he won the white women vote by 30. He won 12% of Democrats and 51% of Independents, who comprise a larger share of the electorate than either party.

In 2008, McCain carried the white vote by 19 points, 15 points less than Romney. It’s clear what’s going on in Arizona. This is one state where Republicans fought back against the one-sided push for amnesty. They articulated the problems with our porous border and the burden on our safety net and public funds. So while Obama’s race-baiting has netted him some extra votes with Hispanics, he got crushed with white voters. That’s why Axelrod’s early bragging about going after Arizona died down so quickly, despite the increase in Hispanic turnout.

As RCP’s inimitable analyst, Sean Trende, points out in his book, The Lost Majority, it’s almost impossible to obtain permanent majority coalitions. In order to pursue certain voters, politicians inevitably overplay their hand and throw existing voters out of the party. There has clearly been a massive white flight from the Democrat Party in Arizona as a result of Obama’s hard-left stance on illegal immigration. That flight is actually taking place across the country. We need to find a way to permanently pick up those voters, while finding other ways to reach out to Hispanics (Obama’s war on the Catholic Church). We also need to work on ground game. There are a lot of things we need to do, but making Lindsey Graham the face of the Republican Party is not one of them.

[Southerner]

Polling shows Romney's pro-enforcement more popular than Obama's pro-amnesty

By Roy Beck, Friday, November 9, 2012, 9:53 AM EST

Let me arm you with some very important numbers to resist a frantic push today by open-borders-leaning journalists and pundits to persuade congressional Republicans to help Pres. Obama pass a mass amnesty early next year.

Their argument is that Gov. Romney's highly public support for immigration enforcement cost him the election. And they suggest that Pres. Obama's support for legalizing illegal aliens was a much more popular position with voters.

Many Bush-era-retreads are part of the loud chorus of demands that Republicans will improve their popularity if they stop blocking amnesties.

Not so, according to exit polling sponsored by Breitbart News & Judicial Watch.

STARTLING EXIT POLL FINDING

The scientific national sample of 800 respondents by cell phone had a margin of error of 3.46%, and the partisan breakdown was D +3.

The poll found this support for two very different responses to illegal immigration:

61% of voters said they favor Arizona-style immigration laws.
40% of voters said they support the Obama Administration's administrative action to give two-year work permits to younger illegal immigrants.

The report noted that the exit polling was consistent with a CBS poll in August that found 63% of voters believed Arizona's immigration enforcement laws are either "about right" or "didn't go far enough."

For a fine overview of other polling and analysis of the media's illogical conclusions from this election, be sure to read (and comment on) Jeremy's blog.

PRO-Enforcement Romney Had Better 'Spreads' Than NON-Enforcement McCain In Most High-Hispanic States

With so much attention being given to Hispanic voting in the states, we wanted to see how such a strong pro-enforcement candidate like Romney did in the 20 states with the highest percentage of Hispanic voters.

The question on positions is not really about how a position might affect a single demographic group but what might be the overall net effect among all voters of that state.

So, we compared Romney's overall voter performance in those 20 states with that of the Republican nominee in 2008. While Romney ran as a decided PRO-enforcement candidate pushing especially for interior enforcement to keep illegal aliens from jobs and benefits, John McCain ran as a NON-enforcement candidate. He didn't oppose enforcement (like Obama), but he didn't advocate it.

What we found was that PRO-enforcement Romney significantly improved his "spread" in those high-Hispanic states, over that of NON-enforcement McCain.

For example, Obama's spread over McCain in Nevada was 12%. That means his share of the vote was 12 percentage points higher than McCain's.

But Obama's Nevada spread over Romney was 6%. The PRO-enforcement Romney improved the spread by 6 points. For whatever reasons, Romney's heavy pro-enforcement positions did not end up causing him to do worse than McCain who didn't push enforcement.

In Arizona, native-son McCain's spread over Obama was 9%. Romney's spread was 12%. So, Romney improved the GOP's Arizona spread by 3 points.

In 16 of the top 20 Hispanic states, Romney improved on McCain's spread with Obama:

Utah by 19 points
Illinois by 9 points
Kansas by 7 points
Nevada by 6 points
Connecticut by 6 points
Colorado by 5 points
New Mexico by 5 points
Washington by 5 points
Texas by 5 points
California by 3 points
Arizona by 3 points
Georgia by 3 points
Hawaii by 3 points
Florida by 2 points
Maryland by 1 point

There was no change in the spread in New York and Rhode Island. Romney's spread was worse than McCain's by 2 points in New Jersey and by 3 points in Idaho.

You may have noticed that there aren't many swing states in that list. That's because Ohio, Virginia, Wisconsin, Iowa, New Hampshire and other highly competitive states have very small Hispanic electorates.

It would be foolish to conclude that Romney's pro-enforcement positions were the primary cause of his improvement over McCain. But the open-borders journalists and pundits seem to be trying to say the opposite -- that maybe Romney lost some of these states because of his pro-enforcement positions even though he actually had some significant improvements over the non-enforcement GOP candidate in the last election.

For a much more thoughtful look at how issues other than immigration are the reason for Republicans' difficulty with Hispanic voters, read this blog in Slate.

POLL SHOWS HISPANICS SUPPORT THE E-VERIFY THAT CONGRESSIONAL GOP LEADERS CONTINUE TO BLOCK

Whether or not most Hispanic voters were able to find their way through all the media bombast, hyperbole and misdirection about Romney's immigration stance, a poll last month shows that most Hispanic voters support Romney's key plank of mandating E-Verify to keep illegal aliens from getting U.S. jobs.

Perhaps Romney didn't communicate his position adeptly enough. Even more likely is that most Hispanic voters marked their ballots based on a host of other issues in their choice for president. But Republicans failed to get the votes of anywhere near the number of Hispanic Americans who favor mandatory E-Verify.

A Pulse Opinion Research poll released last month found 66% of Hispanic voters favoring mandatory E-Verify.

The question was: Do you support or oppose requiring that every employer use E-Verify to electronically ensure that no U.S. job goes to illegal immigrants in the future?

75% of all voters said YES.
69% of Hispanic voters said YES.

The majority of Romney's immigration policy was just that. Mandatory E-Verify was nearly the whole basis of what he meant by "self-deportation." What he explained was that he would take away the jobs magnet and mainly let illegal immigrants make their own decisions about moving back home.

The question just before the E-Verify question was: Do you believe most parents around the world would stop bringing their children illegally to this country if they thought finding a job was doubtful?

66% of all voters said YES.
70% of Hispanic voters said YES.

Can these results be in the ballpark? Well, on the survey's question of sympathizing with so-called Dream-Act illegal immigrants, the result for Hispanic voters was 62%, with only 8% saying "not at all sympathetic." This poll did not over-sample Hispanics, so the margin of error was fairly high. Nonetheless, the key point here is that at least half of Hispanic voters recognize that illegal immigration is bad for the country and that taking away the jobs magnet with mandatory E-Verify is a great way to slow it down.

Thus, taking a stand for mandatory E-Verify should not hurt a candidate, especially Republicans who rarely get more than 33% of Hispanic votes.

Any candidate -- Republican or Democrat -- has an opportunity to improve standing with Hispanic voters by connecting support for E-Verify to tackling high unemployment among Hispanic Americans.

BUT DO WE FURTHER LOOSEN THE LABOR MARKET DURING TIMES OF HIGH JOBLESSNESS AND STAGNANT WAGES?

Finally, we must ask the pundits why they are insisting on loosening the labor market and further driving down the value of labor for our American workers.

Does morality ever enter the minds of these political scribblers?

America has a gigantic excess supply of workers. Even if increasing that supply would gain some short-term political advantage, is that really worth causing more suffering among the victims of that over-supply?

When House Speaker Boehner (R) and Majority Leader Cantor (R) say they don't want to hear any more enforcement talk from their Republican Members, all of you have to insist that your own Republican Congressman (if you have one) talks morality and what is right for American workers.

When Senate Majority Leader Reid promises that he will push a foreign-worker-increase bill through next year, all of you have to insist that your own Democratic Senator (if you have one) talks morality and what is right for American workers.

We cannot let up in our fight for less immigration and a tighter labor market while 20 million of our fellow Americans want a full-time job but can't find one, and when many millions more are stuck with declining real wages that already are barely able to support a family.

ROY BECK is the CEO & Founder of NumbersUSA

NumbersUSA's blogs are copyrighted and may be republished or reposted only if they are copied in their entirety, including this paragraph, and provide proper credit to NumbersUSA. NumbersUSA bears no responsibility for where our blogs may be republished or reposted.
Views and opinions expressed in blogs on this website are those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect official policies of NumbersUSA.

[CaptUSA]

Deep breaths, people.

Can we at least see what he's talking about before we start getting hysterical?

(Oh, and I don't believe in the "hispanic vote". I believe in individuals and individuals don't vote based on one issue)

[Southerner]

DUDE, HERE IS WHAT HE IS TALKING ABOUT! (excuse all caps, must be my "hysterics")

In an interview with POLITICO, Paul said he’ll return to Congress this week pushing measures long avoided by his party. He wants to work with liberal Democratic Sen. Patrick Leahy and Republicans to eliminate mandatory minimum sentences for pot possession. He wants to carve a compromise immigration plan with an “eventual path” to citizenship for illegal immigrants, a proposal he believes could be palatable to conservatives. And he believes his ideas — along with pushing for less U.S. military intervention in conflicts overseas — could help the GOP broaden its tent and appeal to crucial voting blocs that handed Democrats big wins in the West Coast, the Northeast and along the Great Lakes.
“We have three big regions where we’re not competitive,” Paul said. “And we have to be competitive in those regions.”
Paul, 49, was elected on the tea party wave that fueled GOP landslide victories in 2010, often declaring on the campaign trail that he had a “message” from the tea party: “We have come to take our government back.”

[Southerner]

The question is, is he trying to out-rubio RUBIO?

[brandon]

Arizona is not very important. It's only 11 votes and it's a pretty safe red state. ON the other hand - Republicans can very likely pick up Florida's 29 if they just appeal to the hispanics a bit more than they have been. I believe Republicans embracing a path to citizenship and birthright citizenship is a path to national success.

[AuH20]

The question is, is he trying to out-rubio RUBIO?

He could be trying to mitigate potential damage. I bet dollars to donuts that other bills being constructed are much worse than Rand's.

[angelatc]

The question is, is he trying to out-rubio RUBIO?

He's a libertarian. He'd likely prefer open borders and free trade. But the middle of an economic downturn isn't the time to put that on the table.

[July]

He could be trying to mitigate potential damage. I bet dollars to donuts that other bills being constructed are much worse than Rand's.

I would bet money on that one.

Maybe it isn't great timing for this issue, but Obama won, and it has been brought up now like it or not.

[Agorism]

The question is, is he trying to out-rubio RUBIO?

Or out Bush Jeb Bush.

[Lucille]

POLL SHOWS HISPANICS SUPPORT THE E-VERIFY THAT CONGRESSIONAL GOP LEADERS CONTINUE TO BLOCK

Maybe they're blocking it because it's essentially a nat'l ID. Not that the neo-Trots at RedState would have a problem with that.

https://secure.downsizedc.org/etp/e-verify/


This Act would require each American to ask permission from the Federal Government when hiring or being hired.

It creates a de facto National Identification System that could grow to include biometrics such as fingerprints, DNA and/or iris scan. This is tantamount to an unconstitutional, warrantless search.

It won't be long before employers will be required to verify whether employees are delinquent in the payment of federal, state, or local taxes, in compliance with child support or alimony decrees, on a terrorist watch list, or convicted, let alone accused of crime.

Errors in the verification process will be practically immune from timely legal redress, and in 2009 (under a voluntary system) about 80,000 workers likely received erroneous findings from the system and may have lost their jobs.

Despite the sales pitch of politicians, this bill doesn't protect employers from criminal prosecution should they employ an individual later proven to be in the U.S. illegally, or who has successfully assumed a fake or stolen identity.

The loss of jobs will be staggering as employers substitute machinery for employees or outsource employment to avoid the vexations and costs of compliance, as will the loss of tax revenues as jobs go underground — just what we need in today's economy.

It will create an unprecedented black market demand for fake identities coveted by those seeking employment, particularly for short-term jobs where illegal workers will be long-gone before there is any chance of detection.

And will make it very difficult for law-abiding victims of identity theft to find work. Once again, this could be you.

E-Verify is a national identification and surveillance system run by the same friendly people who brought you the airport TSA system. It will lead to even more bureaucracy, greater surveillance, and less freedom.

[CaptainAmerica]

-Cut taxes,bring back businesses
-End the war on drugs ,cut the flow of money to the cartels
-shut the BATF down for its role in supplying cartels
-End social welfare
-im tired of this subject its never going to change

[Todd]

Deep breaths, people.

Can we at least see what he's talking about before we start getting hysterical?

(Oh, and I don't believe in the "hispanic vote". I believe in individuals and individuals don't vote based on one issue)

I'd like to believe that is ture except when I look at the African American vote for Obama. Around 96% I believe.

[Southerner]

I read that 59 (primarily black) voting districts in Philly went 100% for 0bama. Not one Romney or Johnson vote. Not one. If thats true, either you can believe that people are just that stupid, or there was massive voter fraud.

http://articles.philly.com/2012-11-12/news/35069785_1_romney-supporters-mitt-romney-sasha-issenberg

[erowe1]

I read that 59 (primarily black) voting districts in Philly went 100% for 0bama. Not one Romney or Johnson vote. Not one. If thats true, either you can believe that people are just that stupid, or there was massive voter fraud.

http://articles.philly.com/2012-11-12/news/35069785_1_romney-supporters-mitt-romney-sasha-issenberg

I heard some were above 100%. I haven't looked into it though.

[Southerner]

"The unanimous support for Obama in these Philadelphia neighborhoods - clustered in almost exclusively black sections of West and North Philadelphia - fertilizes fears of fraud, despite little hard evidence.

Upon hearing the numbers, Steve Miskin, a spokesman for Republicans in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, brought up his party's voter-identification initiative - which was held off for this election - and said, "We believe we need to continue ensuring the integrity of the ballot."

The absence of a voter-ID law, however, would not stop anyone from voting for a Republican candidate.

Larry Sabato, a political scientist at the University of Virginia who has studied African American precincts, said he had occasionally seen 100 percent of the vote go for the Democratic candidate. Chicago and Atlanta each had precincts that registered no votes for Republican Sen. John McCain in 2008.

"I'd be surprised if there weren't a handful of precincts that didn't cast a vote for Romney," he said. But the number of zero precincts in Philadelphia deserves examination, Sabato added.

"Not a single vote for Romney or even an error? That's worth looking into," he said.
1 | 2 | 3 | Next »
"

[whoisjohngalt]

Both of these articles are terrible and do nothing to support their premise.

Here is what you would need accompanying those studies to make them relevant:

How likely is a candidates stance on immigration going to impact your support for him?
A) I'm a single issue voter and its the sole issue that determines my support for a candidate
B) My support for a candidate is heavily influenced by a candidate's immigration position
C) A candidate's immigration position does little to determine whether or not I will support them
D) I don't care about a candidates immigration position, at all

Get the answer to this question, and you will see why this argument falls apart at the seams. Hispanic voters are far more likely to make this their single issue or one of their most important issues than your average non-Hispanic voter.

Furthermore, it ignores the two party dynamic in which everything is judged only by its comparative value. Not to mention perception of the party as opposed to actual position of the party.

[erowe1]

Both of these articles are terrible and do nothing to support their premise.

Here is what you would need accompanying those studies to make them relevant:

How likely is a candidates stance on immigration going to impact your support for him?
A) I'm a single issue voter and its the sole issue that determines my support for a candidate
B) My support for a candidate is heavily influenced by a candidate's immigration position
C) A candidate's immigration position does little to determine whether or not I will support them
D) I don't care about a candidates immigration position, at all

Get the answer to this question, and you will see why this argument falls apart at the seams. Hispanic voters are far more likely to make this their single issue or one of their most important issues than your average non-Hispanic voter.

Furthermore, it ignores the two party dynamic in which everything is judged only by its comparative value. Not to mention perception of the party as opposed to actual position of the party.

That's true. For all the talk about how much the Republican base is supposedly against illegal immigration, it sure doesn't show up when it comes to the candidates they nominate for office.

[whoisjohngalt]

"that maybe Romney lost some of these states because of his pro-enforcement positions even though he actually had some significant improvements over the non-enforcement GOP candidate in the last election."

This is not the same as the actual argument being made, that changing the candidate's stance on immigration could put the states in play.

All boys wear hats. Sally is a girl. Therefore, Sally is not wearing a hat. This is called denying the antecedent. Yet another fallacy.

I won't even get into comparing performance to John McCain's performance and trying to in any way tie that to their stances on immigration. Especially when looking at the voter population as a whole, and not just those who claim to be heavily influenced by a candidate's position on immigration. These articles deserve no attention.

[Agorism]

Drudge has a headline on Rand coming out in favor of amnesty.

[amy31416]

Didn't Obama deport like a mofo relative to Bush?

[Feeding the Abscess]

Didn't Obama deport like a mofo relative to Bush?

Yeah, and if the Romney/Ryan ticket wanted to win they could have exploited that.

[amy31416]

Yeah, and if the Romney/Ryan ticket wanted to win they could have exploited that.

That, and so much more. I often wonder if it's them or if it's the advisors. I suspect the latter.

[erowe1]

Drudge has a headline on Rand coming out in favor of amnesty.

He must have changed it. Now it just says "path to citizenship."

[Agorism]

bump

Stop Graham-Schumer-Paul

[69360]

I read that 59 (primarily black) voting districts in Philly went 100% for 0bama. Not one Romney or Johnson vote. Not one. If thats true, either you can believe that people are just that stupid, or there was massive voter fraud.

http://articles.philly.com/2012-11-12/news/35069785_1_romney-supporters-mitt-romney-sasha-issenberg

It's not fraud. These are densely populated 100% black, 100% democratic neighborhoods. GOTV is as easy as knocking on doors that are 20 feet apart and walking voters to a polling place a few blocks away.

Contrast this with the Republican heavy south and middle America where house are a half a mile apart and the polling place is a 20 mile drive.

The results are obvious.

[Brett85]

bump

Stop Graham-Schumer-Paul

Nowhere did Rand say that he supported Graham's bill. He's likely introducing his own bill as a "conservative alternative" to Graham's bill, and will end up voting against Graham's bill.

[Agorism]

Nowhere did Rand say that he supported Graham's bill. He's likely introducing his own bill as a "conservative alternative" to Graham's bill, and will end up voting against Graham's bill.

I'm sure it will be equally ridiculous.

[erowe1]

I'm sure it will be equally ridiculous.

Ridiculous meaning what? That it will result in the government not deporting people?

[Agorism]

Ridiculous meaning what? That it will result in the government not deporting people?

Who said that?

[erowe1]

Who said that?

I'm asking. Hence the curly symbol at the end of both sentences.

[Agorism]

I'm asking. Hence the curly symbol at the end of both sentences.

No I don't favor massive deportations. But I do favor enforcing the law.

[erowe1]

No I don't favor massive deportations. But I do favor enforcing the law.

All laws?

[Brett85]

No I don't favor massive deportations. But I do favor enforcing the law.

The law says that illegal immigrants should be deported, so you support massive deportations of illegal immigrants.

[Brett85]

It's funny that no one ever criticizes Ron for his proposal that Tom Tancredo labeled "amnesty with an asterisk."

http://www.wnd.com/2011/05/298533/

"While he says he opposes amnesty, he argues, “Maybe a ‘green card’ with an asterisk could be issued.” This “asterisk” would deny them welfare and not grant them immediate “automatic citizenship.” Both these qualifications are meaningless because every amnesty proposal makes illegal aliens jump through some symbolic hoops before they get amnesty."

[Agorism]

The law says that illegal immigrants should be deported, so you support massive deportations of illegal immigrants.

The law says jay walking is illegal too. Rarely enforced although still occasionally it is.

If they want a "path to citizenship" or amnesty no one is preventing them from going back to where ever, and waiting in line like many others are. If they want to work here illegally, well that' their prerogative.

[Zippyjuan]

Drudge has a headline on Rand coming out in favor of amnesty.

Rand did say he thought some conservatives might consider his plan an amnesty but said he felt his "conservative credentials" were good enough he could get away with it.
What the Politico article and Rand said on the issue:

Paul plans to inject himself into the middle of the GOP’s emotional immigration debate in the wake of Romney losing swing states with heavy Latino populations like Florida, Colorado and Nevada. Paul is working on a novel plan that he says would “assimilate” many of the 12 million illegal immigrants currently in the country. Those individuals, he said, could apply for legal status, but immigration would then be clamped down in the interim. He also says his plan would toughen security at the border.

“I want to show what conservatives would or can accept,” he said in describing his plan. “If we assimilate those who are here, however they got here — don’t make it an easy path for citizenship. There would be an eventual path, but we don’t make anybody tomorrow a citizen who came here illegally. But if they’re willing to work, willing to pay taxes, I think we need to normalize those who are here.”

Paul said the “trade-off” would be “not to accept any new legal immigrants while we’re assimilating the ones who are here.” Asked if he is concerned about the ripple effect that could cause around the world, Paul said the details over which countries would be affected are still in the works.


Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1112/83737_Page2.html#ixzz2CFRuUM2y

[erowe1]

If they want to work here illegally, well that' their prerogative.

But if you support enforcing the law then you support punishing their employers for that.

[UMULAS]

Jesus Christ guys, what Rand did was amazing, he has my full support. He is making sure that Libertarianism and the GOP can come together and you guys bitch and complain.

If anyone wants to tell me why amnesty, illegal immigration, or immigration is wrong, please reply.

[FrankRep]

(Oh, and I don't believe in the "hispanic vote". I believe in individuals and individuals don't vote based on one issue)

It exists whether you believe it or not.

[erowe1]

Jesus Christ guys, what Rand did was amazing, he has my full support. He is making sure that Libertarianism and the GOP can come together and you guys bitch and complain.

If anyone wants to tell me why amnesty, illegal immigration, or immigration is wrong, please reply.

I think it depends what amnesty means. But as far as illegal immigration, there shouldn't be any, because it should all be legal. I don't think that has to involve making them all citizens.

[Austrian Econ Disciple]

I think it depends what amnesty means. But as far as illegal immigration, there shouldn't be any, because it should all be legal. I don't think that has to involve making them all citizens.

This. Anyone should be free to come and go as they please. Giving them voting privileges is an entirely different subject matter. There should be no classification of an 'illegal' - that's just authoritarian bullshit and violates fundamental basics of property rights. No checkpoints, no TSA, no border patrol, no customs.

I don't see a reason if say, you've resided here in America for a period of 15 years, that granting you voting privileges is wrong - then again, my 'version' of voting privileges would never see the light of day (receive money through the Government - no vote for you!).

[Agorism]

But if you support enforcing the law then you support punishing their employers for that.

No, why would you punish employers...

Sounds like soviet russia.

[erowe1]

No, why would you punish employers...

Sounds like soviet russia.

That's what the law is. You know, the thing you said you want enforced.

If you don't support deporting people, and you don't support punishing employers, then what's left? What laws do you want enforced?

[trey4sports]

If this helps Rand win votes i'm all for it. As long as he doesn't compromise liberty im ok with him doing what he needs to do to win.