1. When Barack Obama came out with his new immigration policy —
effectively halting most deportations of illegal immigrants under
age 30 subject to restrictions along the lines of the DREAM Act,
complete with work permit eligibility — I’m sure he thought it was
a no-brainer. After all, the move would please Hispanic activists
who have been irritated by his inaction on “comprehensive”
legislation and (he hopes) promote Hispanic turnout in November.
Plus the amnesty in question is, in theory, temporary and limited
to a very sympathetic subset of illegal immigrants. Who would want
to deport children who were brought into the country through no
fault of their own by their parents and can’t even speak their
native country’s language?
I’m not sure it’s such a no-brainer, however. There’s a reason
the elite’s pro-amnesty consensus has been repeatedly rebuffed by
both Democratic and Republican Congresses: the idea isn’t very
popular and splits both parties. Illegal immigration has receded as
an issue, both because of increased focus on the economy and the
fact that illegal immigration itself is down, partly because of the
economic downturn. Obama’s gambit revives the issue and potentially
puts him on the losing side. The imagery of new work permits for
illegal workers — even sympathetic ones — won’t sit well with a
lot of unemployed Americans.
Second, by doing this through a new executive branch policy
rather than legislatively he has given Mitt Romney a lot of room to
maneuver. Romney can opposed the substance of the policy, as he did
when he opposed the DREAM Act during the primaries. He can also
criticize the president for short-circuiting a long-term,
bipartisan legislative solution, as he did when he sided with Marco
Rubio on this issue. And he can focus on the procedure the
president used while remaining vague about his own policy
preferences, as he has done
most recently. The most likely outcome is Romney telling
different groups of voters what they want to hear, and Obama has
just given him more flexibility to do so.
Finally, Obama’s immigration edict has the same flaws as most
comprehensive reform bills. Since it isn’t really an exercise of
prosecutorial discretion limited to a small number of individual
hardship cases, people will have to apply for legalization. The
administration isn’t devoting much in the way of new resources to
determining the validity of these applications, meaning that the
number of people legalized may exceed the number of people eligible
(as was the case with the 1986 amnesty). When people are asked if
they trust the government to sort out the good immigrants from the
bad, that’s when popular support for various immigration proposals
plummet.
2. To put all of the above more succinctly by paraphrasing
New York Times columnist Ross Douthat: Obama is assuming
that only Latinos have strong opinions about immigration and that
Latinos are monolithic pro-amnesty voting bloc. Both assumptions
are highly dubious.
3. But immigration will fade into the background again if the
Supreme Court rules on Obamacare this week. Justice Ruth Bader
Ginsburg
hinted at divisions on the court over the issue, but didn’t tip
her hand as to whhich why her colleagues would rule.
4. Ron Paul finally won Iowa. This weekend, he swept 21 of 25
contestable delegates to the Republican National Convention in
Tampa. That is a bigger bloc of Iowa delegates than either Romney
or Rick Santorum hold. This was the first convention fight since
Rand Paul endorsed Romney for president.
5. Romney is in the best political shape he’s been in since the
campaign began. But if you think it is impossible for an
anti-solvency party to prevail, please take note of the Greek
elections.
