Republicans Have No Plans on Immigration Reform

by Prerna Lal · 2009-10-20 14:00:00 UTC
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Michael SteeleIn a nutshell, that is what we can gather from the Jorge Ramos interview with RNC Chairman, Michael Steele.

When asked to issue a statement regarding what plans he had for the 12 million undocumented immigrants in the United States, Steele said:

"...the party as I said is always the party, its been the party of assimilation and that is something that we believe in very firmly and basically what we should be saying is that there are rules that you need to get into the country, go the right door, fill out the right form, have some apple pie, hum a few bars of the star spangle banner and get to work, God bless you, and I think that that begins to set us on the right road to dealing with this issue."

Does that mean the Republican Party supports spending billions in hunting down, detaining, litigating and deporting all undocumented immigrants to their countries and asking them to 'get in line?' Good luck.

Steele makes getting citizenship sound so easy. If only it was as easy as going down to the local immigration office, filling out some forms, eating apple pies and singing the national anthem, we wouldn't have the problem of 12 million undocumented immigrants living in the shadows of society.

The GOP track record with Latino voters is dismal and Republicans have continuously irritated the Latino community this year, especially during the Sotomayor hearings, which led to the early resignation of their only Latino GOP senator, Mel Martinez (FL). Even Senator McCain, once a champion of immigration reform, is still licking his wounds over losing 68% of the Latino vote to Barack Obama and refusing to budge on the issue of immigration reform.

Given that Latinos overwhelmingly support immigration reform and are the fastest growing ethnic group in this country, opposing the issue based on reactionary politics only hurts Republicans.

Try again Michael Steele.

(Picture: Creative Commons from WisPolitics Flickr stream)

Prerna Lal is co-founder and Online Coordinator of DreamActivist and a board member of Immigration Equality. She is currently attending George Washington University Law School.
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