Immigration: Politics

First I want to apologize for the intermittent post lately. I just started a new job and it's been pretty frenetic at first. But I will be able to return to a regular schedule pretty soon.

As promised, I'm going to talk about the super-sensitive topic of immigration and why there is no apparent middle ground. People who criticize illegal immigration get accused of being racists, and those who come out for continued immigration in general get accused of anti-Americanism. I have gotten an earful of both, although more of the former than the latter.

This does NOT mean that there is no middle ground. But there are deeply held beliefs on both sides. Pro-immigration forces, led by Latinos, are trying to protect a vulnerable constituency and people who are frequently their co-ethnics. Anti-immigrant forces are very afraid of the future, and have somewhat of a tendency to xenophobia. So the immigration debate is pushed by the extremes of the debate, both of whom are very passionate.

But the real problem is one of political leadership, not rabid constituency. Hispanics are the largest share of new migrants, and they have become the largest potential swing group in American politics. The Republicans face a demoralizing calculus: if they do not do better among Latino voters, they are quite simply doomed within the next 20-30 years. Both parties recognize the importance of this new voting bloc, and the strategists in both parties are falling all over themselves to cater to it. Many of them think that the most important issue to Hispanics is immigration, so they call for more open borders. In reality the most important issues to Hispanics are health care, jobs, and education (just like everybody else), but what can you do?

The Democrats, with their humanitarian and pro-minority bent, have generally been in favor of large immigration and generosity to illegals. Their quandry is that they would like to win over the white working class vote, which is anti-immigrant. The Republicans, on the other hand, already have that anti-immigrant constituency, which threatens to truncate their ability to appeal to Hispanic votes. The business community also likes things the way they are since they can use illegals to block union formation, hold down wages, and circumvent regulations. So the Republican strategy has been somewhat schitzo, because the party is so divided.

Immigration is an easy issue for neither party, precisely because they are experiencing countervailing presssures. The real question is whether this issue will grow in importance or fade. If it grows, then it will probably consolidate Latinos behind Democrats and the white working class behind Republicans. If it declines, then Democrats will have to fight to keep those voters.

If it were possible, I believe that the correct political, as well as policy, stance is to sharply distinguish between legal and illegal immigration, encouraging moderate amounts of the former while dealing with the latter. Then we should use the New Populism argument of Sirota etc. to appeal to the Latino votes on the issues which are both more important to them anyway and which they share with other Democrats (AND the white working class). It will be difficult to thread this needle, but we need to find a way.