As they adage goes, elections have consequences. And nowhere more clearly than in the current politics of immigration reform. It’s probably not right to say that opinions in the GOP have changed on the issue. It’s more that people who supported reform mid-decade but gave way after a party revolt are now back to it after the 2012 election in which Republicans were seen as paying a steep price for hostility to immigration and, relatedly, the rising national Hispanic community.
Yesterday’s announcement makes clear that Senate Republicans are generally onboard with real reform. Notably, that body is made up of people who a) need to run for reelection in non gerrymandered jurisdictions and b) in many cases want to run for President.
The House is a very different story. I was chatting with a top GOP Senate staffer a few days ago who noted that the House GOP leadership has actually been pretty supportive of the Senate GOP’s reform principles. But that’s the key: the leadership.
I’m very curious to see just where everyone lines up on this. But it looks less like a traditional ideological battle than one between leadership and the base of the party or the backbenchers in the House. In that sense it actually reminds me a bit of the dynamics of the debt ceiling and cliff debacles — leadership mainly trying to get the whole issue behind them but actually voting representatives unwilling to give way, largely because their incentives and ambitions are very different. The hard right winger in a gerrymandered district in the South isn’t worried as much about the national political climate and he or she isn’t ever planning on running for President. It kind of makes me think we may have in store for us the same kind of multi-month House GOP freakout before the factions in the House tacitly agree to disagree and let Boehner pass the thing on Democratic votes.
Limbaugh says he’ll try to stop it. But will that crew be able to coalesce and consolidate enough opposition in the House to really slow this down? Curious to hear your thoughts. Again, to me, it’s more elite versus base for the GOP than ideological in the narrow sense. But let me know if that makes sense to you.
