Posts

Rubio: If I Had to Vote Again On My Gang of Eight Immigration Bill, I’d Vote No

Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

I hope you guys appreciate how hard he’s been pandering to you lately. Because he’s pandering awfully hard.

This reminds me of the debate before the 2012 primaries got rolling over whether Romney should repudiate RomneyCare. Lots of righties said yes, definitely. He’s got to get that monkey off his back; otherwise he’ll be vulnerable in facing an ObamaCare-hating electorate. I thought he was right to stand by it for the simple reason that he already had so many flip-flops to his record, another one — a big one — could be fatal. It would prove that there’s nothing, up to and including his signature “achievement” as governor, that he wouldn’t abandon to protect his own electability. Better to be a RINO who stands on principle than a guy who’ll always pander, leaving you to wonder if you can trust him when the political tides change.

Are we at that point with Rubio yet?

Asked directly how he would vote if Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid brought the same bill to the floor now, he said he would vote no because passing the bill now wouldn’t be productive.

Read more from this story HERE.

McCain: I Don’t Know How Many Passports the Amnesty Bill Lets Illegal Aliens Forge

Photo Credit: APSenator John McCain (R-Ariz.), a member of the “Gang of Eight” that helped write and pass the immigration reform bill in that chamber, said he did not know how many passports a person could forge under the proposed law before being charged with a crime.

On Capitol Hill on Wednesday, CNSNews.com asked McCain, “Senator McCain, can I ask you a question about the Senate immigration bill? Under the bill, how many passports can someone forge before it becomes a crime?”

McCain said, “You’re going to have to ask our folks that, I don’t think that we stand for any forgeries”…

In the legislation that passed in the Senate, Section 1541 “Trafficking in Passports,” it explains in detail that a person can be charged for a crime if they forge “3 or more passports,” meaning that they potentially would not be charged if they falsely made only one or two passports. The criminal charges and penalties do not kick in until after “3 or more passports” are falsely made, issued, or transferred, etcetera.

Read more from this story HERE.

Black American Leadership Alliance Marches With Thousands in DC for Jobs and Against Amnesty

Photo Credit: APBy Matthew Boyle. Thousands of grassroots activists from all around the country descended on Washington, D.C., on Monday for the Black American Leadership Alliance (BALA) March For Jobs, a movement against amnesty aimed at defeating the Senate “Gang of Eight” immigration bill.

The activists convened at Freedom Plaza early and several speakers rose up against amnesty there before they marched from the downtown landmark near the White House up Pennsylvania Avenue onto Capitol Hill. Rep. Steve King (R-IA) spoke at Freedom Plaza and then led the march through the capital to Congress.

“We have a great country,” King said at Freedom Plaza. “Our Founding Fathers framed it for us. Their job was harder than ours is. They had to identify the pillars of American exceptionalism. We just have to defend them.”

“The rule of law,” King continued. “You can’t be a great nation without the rule of law. And you can’t have amnesty and still have the rule of law. All Democrats and Independents in the Senate believe there ought to be amnesty. Some Republicans think that also.” Read more from this story HERE.

_____________________________________________________________________

Photo Credit: APRev. Peterson: working class black Americans don’t want immigration bill

By Tony Lee. Reverend Jesse Lee Peterson, who founded the South Central Los Angeles Tea Party, emphasized on Monday that working class black Americans and those at the bottom of the economic ladder oppose the Senate’s immigration bill, contrary to what politicians and those who represent them in Congress may claim.

“Politicians want amnesty,” Peterson said on Breitbart News’ exclusive broadcast of the D.C. March for Jobs rally. “People don’t.” Read more from this story HERE.

GOP Immigration Plan Devised by Communist Party

Photo Credit: WNDThe U.S. Senate’s “Gang of Eight” immigration-reform plan, as well as a strikingly similar plan now being backed by Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., and a bi-partisan House “Gang,” both offer the “roadmap to citizenship” originally conceived and carefully developed by members of the Communist Party USA working within the Democratic Party and the radical left activist network for the purpose of using amnestied illegals to build a “permanent progressive majority.”

That is the inescapable conclusion readers will draw after reading the forthcoming book by acclaimed researcher and blogger Trevor Loudon, titled “The Enemies Within: Communists, Socialists and Progressives in the U.S. Congress.” Although not yet published, Loudon agreed to allow readers to preview one chapter, titled “Latino Immigrants: Tools to Ensure a ‘Governing Coalition’ for the Left.”

In the book, Loudon exhaustively documents the Left’s longtime agenda regarding illegal aliens and how its activists have gone about implementing it. He provides irrefutable proof that the entire immigration-reform movement was the brainchild of American communists and that their goal has long been to establish unchallengeable political supremacy.

According to Loudon, the Communist Party USA has influenced U.S. policy toward illegals since at least the 1960s. He traces the history, showing how communists and communist-founded organizations slowly built the movement from the ground up. While other groups certainly joined the effort, the communists were always at the center.

For example, he tells the story of CPUSA member Bert Corona, the “Communist Father of the ‘Immigrants Rights’ movement.” In 1964, Corona, Cesar Chavez and future Democratic Socialists of America member Dolores Huerta forced Congress to end the guest worker “Bracero” program. Later, Corona sought ways to address “problems confronting Mexicans in the United States who had no visas or citizenship documents” – in other words, illegal aliens – including “how to defend persons detained by immigration authorities and how to help immigrants acquire disability and unemployment insurance and welfare.”

Along the way, Corona founded and/or led numerous organizations, such as the Mexican American Political Association, or MAPA, Centro de Action Social Autonoma, or CASA, and La Hermandad Mexicana Nacional (the National Mexican Brotherhood), all influential in the “immigrant rights” movement. The Communist Party still has strong influence in MAPA, which acts as a king-maker for Democratic Party candidates in the Los Angeles area.

Antonio Villaraigosa, former Los Angeles mayor and 2012 chairman of the Democratic National Convention, got his start with CASA. He was also a former member of the Communist Venceremos Brigades and worked with the Brigades in Cuba. As mayor of Los Angeles, he was “the most pro-illegal immigrant mayor the city has ever seen.”

Lorenzo Torrez, a long-time organizer of the Arizona Communist Party, paved the way for Communist-backed Congressmen Ed Pastor and Raul Grijalva to win congressional seats in Arizona. He organized opposition to Southwestern states attempting to prevent illegal immigration and also helped change voting patterns across the entire region.

Loudon’s book identifies many influential communist and socialist politicians holding positions of influence in Congress and state and local governing bodies. For example, Rep. Judy Chu, D.-Calif., writes Loudon, has “a thirty-year history with the now defunct pro-China Communist Workers Party (CWP) and its surviving networks.” Chu is an advocate for “progressive” immigration reform and was a co-sponsor of the Comprehensive Immigration Reform bill introduced by Rep. Luis Gutierrez in 2010. In 2012, Chu served as co-chair of President Obama’s reelection campaign.

Today’s Communist Party USA cites the current amnesty effort as its top legislative priority. Its official position is virtually indistinguishable from that of the Democratic Party:

As Congress begins to draft legislation, immigrant rights groups and the labor movement including the AFL-CIO and its constituent organizations, SEIU, Change to Win, and many faith-based groups are mobilizing for comprehensive immigration reform with legalization, a path to citizenship and workers’ rights …

This legislative and political battle is also at the top of the agenda of the Communist Party USA and Young Communist League. Our program includes stopping deportations now as legislation is being adopted, and calling for legalization with a clear and speedy road map to citizenship for all 11 million. Future workers who come should have the same opportunity.

But it was left to Eliseo Medina to let the cat out of the bag. Medina, writes Loudon, “is both the country’s most influential ‘immigration reform’ activist and a Marxist. He is an Honorary Chair of Democratic Socialists of America”:

Medina learned voting strategies from Fred Ross, a Saul Alinsky-trained activist and the brains behind Cesar Chavez. Ross was to eventually have an impact on the national stage. Fred Ross conceived the voter outreach strategy that not only elected Communist Party affiliate Ed Roybal as Los Angeles’ first Latino Council member in 1949, but also laid the groundwork for the Obama campaign’s Latino voter outreach campaign in 2008 …

Medina worked hand in hand with UNITE HERE President John Wilhelm, to change AFL-CIO immigration policy at the 1999 Los Angeles Convention. Then, claiming U.S. immigration policy is “broken and needs to be fixed,” the AFL-CIO on February 16, 2000, called for a new amnesty for millions of undocumented workers and the repeal of the 1986 law that criminalized hiring them …

According to the SEIU website, Medina has played the leading role in uniting Change to Win and AFL-CIO behind the immigration reform movement …

In 2009, Medina said, “We reform the immigration laws, it puts 12 million people on the path to citizenship and eventually voters. Can you imagine if we have, even the same ratio, two out of three? If we have eight million new voters … We will be creating a governing coalition for the long term, not just for an election cycle …”

Republican support

But why would Republicans get behind such a plan? Some astute political observers advise that when politicians appear to be promoting agendas against their own interest, follow the money. As Center for Immigration Studies Executive Director Mark Krikorian put it, “It’s no surprise that the Republicans supporting this thing are the ones with ties to the Chamber of Commerce, not ordinary voters.”

South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham and others have also stuffed the Senate bill with special perks for their backers – in Graham’s case, a provision granting more visas to workers for South Carolina’s meat industry. Rubio supposedly sought an amendment to assist Florida’s cruise-ship industry although he insists this is untrue.

But even if big business benefits, the cheap labor advantages are only temporary. Once illegal aliens are fully legalized, businesses will be required to provide just as much in pay and benefits as they pay American workers. In the meantime, however, it is widely assumed those workers will take jobs from American citizens, depress wages and increase unemployment. Moreover, in many key swing states, projected amnesties will swamp the rolls of the unemployed (see table).

Proposed Senate legislation delays full citizenship for 13 years, but if a bill passes, follow-on legislation is expected to accelerate that timeframe.

However, it is not even necessary for illegal aliens to achieve citizenship to significantly impact the vote in key districts. As a recent report for Capital Research Center detailed, Democrats are already employing illegals to boost get-out-the-vote efforts among Hispanics and won a major victory in a local Arizona election in 2011. They hope this strategy will win them key swing states, especially Texas, whose electoral votes will, many calculate, provide guaranteed Democratic presidents for the foreseeable future.

House Speaker John Boehner, R.-Ohio, has made much of his intention to ignore the Senate proposal and “do our own bill.” What the House has come up with, however, is considered by most to be “Rubio Lite.”

Boehner has enlisted former Republican VP candidate Ryan to promote the House plan. Ryan and the Republicans are working with some far-left House Democrats, including Rep. Luis Gutierrez, a former member of the Marxist-Leninist Puerto Rican Socialist Party, and Xavier Becerra, both members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus and both longtime amnesty activists.

In an interview following Senate passage of the Gang of Eight bill, Fox News’ Sean Hannity pounded Ryan on the issue of border security:

HANNITY: So, my sources have been telling me, Congressman, that you guys are considering a five-year temporary legal status, and then [if] the border security measure is not met in five years, that that would be revoked.

RYAN: That’s right. That’s right.

HANNITY: I don’t believe that would ever happen.

RYAN: Well, look, they can’t get – what a person would want to have, is they would come out of the shadows, they get put on probation, they pay taxes, pay fines, learning English, learning civics. If they break the terms of their probation, they can be deported. And if the border is not secure by that time, if the verification system is not up and running, they can’t get – not only does that status go away, they can’t legal permanent residence …

So, illegal aliens would be granted legal status immediately, but five years down the road, if the fence still isn’t built and e-verify still isn’t being used, then their legal status would be revoked. Given that the Department of Homeland Security is already allegedly ignoring border security –with immigration and customs agents suing their own agency for failing to enforce the law – many voters place little confidence in political promises of future enforcement.

Boehner has announced a closed-door meeting with the entire Republican caucus, scheduled for tomorrow, Wednesday, July 10, to decide the immigration issue, a meeting Politico calls “the most important day for immigration reform.”

Although this meeting was originally requested by Rep. Steve King, R.-Iowa, to air grave concerns shared by many Republicans over this “reform,” it is unclear if this meeting was the House speaker’s answer to King or his own idea. In either case, many fear Boehner will use the meeting as a vehicle to impose the plan as though it were a done deal.

In the meantime, Senate and House opponents have been painstakingly highlighting what they consider to be glaring flaws in these proposals:

Every single border security provision in the Senate bill, including the hire of 20,000 Border Patrol agents, denying amnesty to criminals, building fences and installing surveillance devices, can be waived by the Homeland Security secretary.
Both the House and Senate proposals emphasize the path to citizenship – the centerpiece of communist efforts – while making border security both vague and secondary.

Both bills provide a $5,000 incentive for companies to hire the newly legalized illegal aliens instead of Americans, since the aliens would not be subject to the Obamacare coverage mandate.

Although politicians and the media have settled on the claim that there are 11 million illegal aliens, the actual number may well be closer to 20 million to 30 million. There were 10 million in 1996, a mere 10 years after Reagan’s amnesty, and it is doubtful only one million more have been added in the ensuing 17 years. Since 1990, Border agents have apprehended on average more than 1 million illegal aliens per year, almost all from Mexico.

When the Reagan amnesty became law, the intention was to naturalize only 1.2 million people, but the actual figure turned out to be 2.7 million. Statistics on illegal immigration have longed tended to be underestimated, sometimes vastly so.

Thus, current proposals provide a path to citizenship for as many as 20 to 30 million illegal aliens here now, plus relatives who will be brought in through chain migration and at least 75 percent of those who will come in the future – virtually endless amnesty – while efforts to secure the border are almost certain to be insufficient.

Representatives Steve King, R-Iowa; Louie Gohmert, R-Texas; Dana Rohrabacher, R-Calif.; Trey Goudy, R-S.C.; Bob Goodlatte, R-Va.; and others – 70 House members in all – as well as senators Ted Cruz, R-Texas; Jeff Sessions, R-Ala.; Mike Lee, R-Utah and others have sought to highlight the dangers of this legislation, with Rep. King recently stating:

If the House passed border security and interior security and sent that over to the Senate, Harry Reid is not going to take that up. Chuck Schumer has said that citizenship has to be part of the deal. It’s not going to go to the president’s desk, so why would the House take up anything if there’s no prospect that we’re going to improve the immigration situation, just the prospect that they’re going to jam amnesty on us?

With polls showing more than two-thirds of Americans don’t believe “immigration laws would be enforced in the future if illegal aliens were given amnesty,” it is clear that passage of the current Republican-backed bill may indeed fulfill the agenda of its communist originators – the creation of a permanent Democrat voting majority, guaranteeing permanent control of the United States government by leftist progressives.

_______________________________________________________________________

James Simpson is an investigative journalist, businessman and former economist and budget examiner for the White House Office of Management and Budget. Mr. Simpson’s work is published at AIM.org, American Thinker, Breitbart, Capital Research Center, Washington Times, WorldNet Daily and elsewhere. He is also featured in Curtis Bowers’ award winning documentary Agenda: Grinding America Down.

Experts: Both Parties Selling Out American Workers with Amnesty Bill

Photo Credit: WND“Self-preservation has always been regarded as the first law of nature…Those who favor unrestricted immigration care nothing for the people. They are simply desirous of flooding the country with unskilled as well as skilled labor of other lands for the purpose of breaking down American standards.” – Samuel Gompers, founder, American Federation of Labor

The Gang of Eight’s Immigration Reform bill was celebrated by groups as diverse as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, LaRaza, Karl Rove and the new leadership of the AFL-CIO. Some observers say this is an example of real political compromise. Others say this is insider political corruption at its worst.

Sen. Ted Cruz says the alliance is not only suspicious, but “egregious” if the goal is actually economic or humanitarian. He says that buried deep in SB 744 is verbiage that allows the IRS to place a $5,000 fee on any employer who hires a legal African-American, Hispanic, union member, or other legal, disadvantaged applicant:

“I filed an amendment that would have corrected one of the most egregious aspects of the Gang of Eight bill as it intersects with Obamacare legislation, namely a penalty imposed on U.S. employers for hiring U.S. citizens and U.S. permanent residents. This bill says if an employer hires a citizen or a legal immigrant, the IRS can impose a $5,000 penalty on that employer. But if the employer instead hires someone with RPI [provisional] status [for illegal aliens], that penalty will go away. That is utterly and completely indefensible.

“Nobody in this body wants to see African-American unemployment go up. Nobody wants to see Hispanic unemployment go up, youth unemployment go up, union household unemployment go up, legal immigrant unemployment go up. Yet every one of those will happen if this Gang of Eight bill passes without fixing this problem. If that happens, all 100 members of the U.S. Senate will be accountable to our constituents for explaining why we voted to put a federal penalty on hiring U.S. citizens and hiring legal immigrants. I hope this body will choose to pass my amendment and fix this grave defect in the Gang of Eight legislation,” he said.

Read more from this story HERE.

Kill the Bill

Photo Credit: Weekly Standard We are conservatives who have differed in the past on immigration reform, with Kristol favorably disposed toward it and Lowry skeptical. But the Gang of Eight has brought us into full agreement: Their bill, passed out of the Senate, is a comprehensive mistake. House Republicans should kill it without reservation.

There is no case for the bill, and certainly no urgency to pass it. During the debate over immigration in 2006–07, Republican rhetoric at times had a flavor that communicated a hostility to immigrants as such. That was a mistake, and it did political damage. This time has been different. The case against the bill has been as responsible as it has been damning.

It’s become clear that you can be pro-immigrant and pro-immigration, and even favor legalization of the 11 million illegal immigrants who are here and increases in some categories of legal immigration—and vigorously oppose this bill.

The bill’s first fatal deficiency is that it doesn’t solve the illegal-immigration problem. The enforcement provisions are riddled with exceptions, loopholes, and waivers. Every indication is that they are for show and will be disregarded, just as prior notional requirements to build a fence or an entry/exit visa system have been—and just as President Obama has recently announced he’s ignoring aspects of Obamacare that are inconvenient to enforce on schedule. Why won’t he waive a requirement for the use of E-Verify just as he’s unilaterally delayed the employer mandate? The fact that the legalization of illegal immigrants comes first makes it all the more likely that enforcement provisions will be ignored the same way they were after passage of the 1986 amnesty.

Marco Rubio says he doesn’t want to have to come back ten years from now and deal with the same illegal-immigration problem. But that’s exactly what the CBO says will happen under his own bill. According to the CBO analysis of the bill, it will reduce illegal immigration by as little as a third or by half at most. By one estimate, this means there will be about 7.5 million illegal immigrants here in ten years. And this is under the implausible assumption that the Obama administration would administer the law as written.

Read more from this story HERE.

After Being Deceived by Rubio on Amnesty, Conservatives Say it Won’t Happen Again

Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

Many conservatives gave Sen. Marco Rubio the benefit of the doubt when he said securing the border first was a top priority for the Gang of Eight comprehensive immigration reform effort. Later, when those conservatives realized that Rubio’s plan would first legalize the country’s estimated 11 million illegal immigrants, and only then put new border security measures in place, they expressed deep disappointment and disillusionment.

Now the Gang bill has passed the Senate and immigration is the work of the House, where former vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan is a leading reform advocate. Ryan favors the same legalization-first sequence for immigration reform that Rubio and the Gang did. The difference is that now, more conservatives are aware of the basics of reform proposals. And that means Ryan might be in for a rougher ride with the conservative base than Rubio experienced.

That, at least, is one conclusion to take from Ryan’s appearance last Wednesday on Sean Hannity’s Fox News program. Hannity interviewed Rubio several times during the Gang of Eight deliberations. In later interviews, Hannity became more skeptical and questioning, and in the last such interview expressed surprise that Rubio had declared legalization would come before border security. With Ryan in the interview chair, the first thing Hannity wanted to know was when securing the border would come in the sequence of immigration reform.

“I’m sure you are aware, a lot of conservatives including myself are angry,” Hannity told Ryan. “No border security first. How do you feel about it?”

Ryan stressed that the House would not take up the Senate Gang of Eight bill. “We want to have real triggers on the border, real triggers on what we call the E-Verify,” Ryan said. But Hannity wanted to know if that meant border security would come first: “Is securing the border first a top priority for you?” he asked.

Read more from this story HERE.

Senate Moves Amnesty Bill Forward, Cruz Hammers Colleagues (+videos)

Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

By Jason Howerton. Highly debated immigration legislation cleared a key Senate hurdle with votes to spare on Monday, pointing the way to near-certain passage within days for $38 billion worth of future security measures along the border with Mexico and an unprecedented chance at citizenship for millions living in the country illegally.

The vote was 67-27, seven more than the 60 needed, with 15 Republicans agreeing to advance legislation at the top of President Barack Obama’s second-term domestic agenda.

Read more from this story HERE.

____________________________________________________________

Sheriff Joe Arpaio: ‘You’ll never secure’ border

By Breanna Edwards. Arizona Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio scoffed at lawmakers’ attempts at showing that the border could be secured, saying that it would never happen – at least not without enforcing some immigration laws.

“[Undocumented immigrants] are very, very innovative. You’ll never secure the border,” Arpaio said on Fox News on Monday. “To say you’re not going to enforce the illegal immigration laws in the interior and blame it on the border, that’s just a copout.” Read more from this story HERE.

Marco Rubio Has Alienated Just About Everyone In The Immigration Debate

Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

By Brett Logiurato. Somewhere along the line in what has become a heated debate over how to reform the nation’s immigration laws, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) lost his base.

That much became clear during a marathon “press conference” on Wednesday that quickly turned into a rally in firm opposition to the immigration bill being debated in the Senate. According to reports from the scene, Rubio was public enemy No. 1 to the crowd, which booed his name when he was mentioned as part of the Senate’s “Gang of Eight.”

An immigration debate that started with so much promise for Rubio — including a mildly successful charm offensive with conservative talk radio — has gotten to the point where he has successfully irritated all political parties involved.

Democrats have grown upset with his recent insistence on including stricter border security measures than the bill initially called for. On Thursday, he voted against a motion to table, or kill, a controversial amendment put forth by Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), which Democrats had called a non-starter and “poison pill.”

Independents, polling shows, don’t approve of his handling of the issue. And some prominent conservatives are starting to turn on him, too. Read more from this story HERE.

________________________________________________________________

Pro-Rubio Radio Star Turns on ‘Amnesty Man’

By Michael Carl. A South Florida talk-radio host who “enthusiastically” supported Marco Rubio in his successful run for the U.S. Senate in 2010 and touted his candidacy on her show, has turned against him, charging he has betrayed the people of his state as a member of the “Gang of Eight” by crafting an immigration bill that provides a “path to citizenship” for illegal aliens.

Joyce Kaufman, who hosts a daily show on WFTL 850 AM, denounced Rubio on her show Wednesday and announced she’s organizing protests against the politician she now calls a “pathological liar, a “fraud” and “The Amnesty Man.”

Kaufman has organized rallies against Rubio at the Lincoln Day Dinner in Port Saint Lucie, Fla., and at his Miami Senate offices.

Rubio is feeling the heat after he told Fox News Channel’s Sean Hannity he knows his moves aren’t winning him any friends among conservatives.

“Look, it’s obvious I didn’t do this for political gain. This is not something that’s going to gain me any parades. People are frustrated, and I do understand it. What I hope they understand is that I studied this issue carefully for almost two years, and I concluded that what we have in place right now is a disaster,” Rubio told Hannity. Read more from this story HERE.

Murkowski, Rubio Join With Democrats to Kill Border Fence Amendment to Immigration Bill

Photo Credit: Reuters

Photo Credit: Reuters

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) said late Tuesday that he supports securing the United States border with Mexico with a double-tiered fence but voted against an amendment to the “Gang of Eight” immigration bill that would have required exactly that.

Rubio and his fellow Gang of Eight Republicans helped the Democrats kill an amendment from Sen. John Thune (R-SD) that would have required the double-tiered fence be built, as current law requires, before amnesty was granted to America’s at least 11 million illegal immigrants. The only other Republican to vote against the amendment was Sen. Lisa Murkowski…

The amendment would have undercut Rubio’s promise to Univision’s Spanish-speaking audience this past weekend that amnesty would come before border security in the end. “First comes the legalization. Then come the measures to secure the border.” He added, “It is not conditional. The legalization is not conditional.”

Read more from this story HERE.