RNC Bows To Ultra-Right On Immigration

It looks like the Republican National Committee has given up on the idea of real immigration reform. After the last election, they realized that they needed to reach out to more minorities. Some of their leaders decided a good way to do that would be to support immigration reform -- an issue important to most in the Hispanic community (which is the fastest growing demographic in the United States, by far).

Unfortunately for that party, most in the GOP's base didn't like that idea. They still seem to think they can return to a country ruled by white male christians, and since that is the view of the base it has become the view of congressional Republicans. While a rather onerous immigration reform bill, with a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants, was able to pass in the Senate -- it did so mainly because of Democrats, with more than twice as many Republicans voting against it than voting for it.

Now that bill rests in the GOP-dominated House of Representatives, where it is as good as dead. House Republican leadership has refused to allow any vote on the senate bill. Instead, they have only taken action on increased border security -- despite the fact that there are more undocumented immigrants leaving the U.S. than entering it, that the Homeland Security Department has already given our border security its top rating, and that we already spend more on border security than on all other federal law enforcement.

The truth is that more border security is not needed. What's needed is a path to citizenship for those who wish to stay in this country. But the congressional GOP has decided to play to the irrational bigoted fears of their teabagger base instead of trying to pass real immigration reform.

And those RNC leaders who thought the party should reach out to Hispanics have now given up that hope, and joined the bigots in their party. The RNC recently passed a resolution calling on congressional Republicans to pass "immigration reform". But the reform they are calling for does not include any path to citizenship, and it would force the "Dreamers" (those brought here as children and who grew up in the U.S.) to reapply every five years (and prove they had a job or risk deportation). Their "reform" is just more border security nonsense.

This will just insure that the Democrats will get most Hispanic votes in the next couple of elections. This move by the RNC says clearly that they no longer care about reaching out to Hispanic voters. That may or may not hurt them in 2014 (depending on turnout), but it certainly will in 2016.