Yep, probably.

This point has been made many, many, many times elsewhere this week, but let me put out a little BOLO of my own just in case attention on our side of the aisle is starting to wander too far from immigration. There are two theories on how Scandalmania might affect O’s second-term agenda. Theory one: [...]

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Weak.

No, the GOP help didn’t come from Rubio. This was a Judiciary Committee vote and he’s not a member. Lindsey Graham and Jeff Flake are, though, and they each voted with Democrats to torpedo Grassley’s amendment demanding that probationary legal status not be granted until the border has been effectively secured for six months. Remember, [...]

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Change.

From a health standpoint, he’s got every reason in the world to drop the weight. From a political standpoint, though? Nonsense, says Harry Enten, and I agree. Christie’s 2016 problem isn’t that he’s “husky,” it’s that he’s a gun-grabbing, Medicaid-expanding, Obama-hugging believer in man-made global warming who, by his own admission, agrees with Andrew Cuomo [...]

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Trillions.

An exhaustive study by the Heritage Foundation has found that after amnesty, current unlawful immigrants would receive $9.4 trillion in government benefits and services and pay more than $3 trillion in taxes over their lifetimes. That leaves a net fiscal deficit (benefits minus taxes) of $6.3 trillion. That deficit would have to be financed by [...]

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"No, no. He’s anti-immigration. Almost every Hispanic in the country wants to see immigration reform."

Via Breitbart, deep thoughts from BR on (a) how insulting our politics has become, and also (b) how Ted Cruz is a phony Latino. Skip to 2:15 for the key bit. Actually, I think Ramesh Ponnuru’s right that the question is arguably more revealing than the answer: I think you can just barely, with charity, [...]

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Borders.

President Obama said there is one thing he absolutely won’t compromise on in immigration reform: a pathway to citizenship. But as for what he would be willing to give up, he won’t say… The president praised the bill produced by the Gang of Eight as a “good piece of work” that doesn’t include everything Obama [...]

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Contender.

In my short tenure, my focus has been — and will remain — on two things: fighting for conservative principles in the Senate, and working to help elect strong conservatives to win a majority in the Senate in 2014. The Senate is the battlefield to defend liberty. I was elected because thousands of grassroots conservatives [...]

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Oh my.

Chris Stirewalt argues yes, and not without reason. Before we get to that, though, I want to flag this WaPo story about Obama leaning on liberals privately to take half a loaf on immigration in the name of getting something passed. Since the beginning of the Gang of Eight’s big push, there’s been a theory [...]

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“If you don’t think this is real, then you’re not paying attention.”

I’m betting that you are. Politico teased this possibility two weeks ago in a piece about the budding Cruz/Rubio rivalry, quoting one Texas Republican in the know as saying, “The worst secret in D.C. is Cruz is going to run for president, and he’s going to lean in hard against immigration to separate himself from [...]

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Oh my.

Raul Labrador’s been saying this for months, that any bill with a “special” path to citizenship for illegals is DOA in the House, but I’m still surprised to hear Rubio say it. You don’t think the GOP leadership can find 30 or so panicky Republican reps to vote with a unified Democratic caucus in the [...]

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Salesmanship.

Rubio really is a one-man conservative outreach program when it comes to this bill. His ties to the tea party base are so deep that reformers were constantly worried he’d abandon negotiations rather than risk an inevitable backlash by signing onto a compromise. Rubio made light of the dynamic at a press conference introducing the [...]

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Society?

Via Michael Goldfarb, a complement to Erick Erickson’s post today at Red State about Republican aides turning desperate, shrill, and repulsive as the Gang of Eight bill runs into stumbling blocks. Quote: MORNING MINDMELD, from GOP Senate aide whose boss favors immigration reform: “The … analysis that the Boston attacks are a setback for immigration [...]

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Heat.

Several dozen tea party members demonstrated outside some of Rubio’s Florida offices on Tuesday to protest the comprehensive immigration bill that Rubio and seven Senate colleagues announced this week, which includes a path to citizenship for up to 11 million immigrants in the country illegally. At one event in Palm Beach Gardens protesters held signs [...]

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It begins.

Even TPM seems incredulous. The left’s supposed to wait until after Republicans help pass amnesty to start shrieking that they’re Latino-hating racists who’ll never change. Enter American Bridge, a prominent Democratic super PAC devoted to tracking Republican candidates and gathering opposition research. The group is out with a dossier Monday entitled “Barriers to Reform: The [...]

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What could go wrong?

Second look at Charlie Crist? No, no second looks at Charlie Crist. Ever. Rubio is planning a media blitz to promote the bill — which is expected to be released early next week — making the rounds on all of the Sunday political talk shows starting this weekend, wooing skeptical conservative radio hosts and pitching [...]

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Allies.

Via CNS and the Media Research Center, a snapshot from yesterday’s “Rally for Citizenship” in D.C. in which a guy who’s done more than any other pol in America to make immigration reform possible ends up eating shinola anyway. I don’t really think this is inexplicable, incidentally. This is a sneak preview of the “thanks” [...]

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Borderlines.

Katrina Trinko has most of the particulars at the Corner. Quote: “One contentious issue among the senators is whether immigrants who are clearly part of gangs but who have no criminal record will be allowed to obtain legal status.” Amnesty fever: Catch it. Securing the border and ending illegal immigration. The gang has focused on [...]

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Hmmmm.

Here’s a better question. Should the GOP filibuster the gun-control bill? Johnny Isakson says no: “I’ll speak for myself on that question,” Isakson said on CBS’s “This Morning” when asked about the filibuster. “There’s no ambivalence on the gun issue, I think everyone knows what the issues are. We have not seen the final draft [...]

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Legality.

In contrast to the Senate plan — which would provide one clear, if difficult, path to citizenship for the 11 million illegal immigrants already in the country — the House legislation will most likely offer three distinct paths to legal status. Young immigrants in the country without legal papers, who often call themselves “Dreamers,” and [...]

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Change?

Is this progress or a runaround? Rubio wrote to Pat Leahy last weekend to urge him not to let the Judiciary Committee rubber-stamp the Gang of Eight’s bill. Democrats want to rush it through, knowing that the longer it ends up being attacked on the Senate floor, the greater the chance the fragile coalitions that [...]

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Concession?

You tell me. Listen below to Schumer on yesterday’s “Meet the Press” describing the process agreed on by the Gang of Eight. First comes probationary legal status, which has always been the Democratic prize. Then comes border security, replete with certain “metrics” to quantify improvement. Then comes the path to citizenship. He doesn’t explicitly say [...]

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Soon?

A day after labor and business groups struck a deal on a new guest-worker program, key senators said they are within reach of finalizing an immigration overhaul proposal. Members of the Senate’s bipartisan “gang of eight,” which is crafting a comprehensive immigration bill, said they have not signed off on a proposal just yet, but [...]

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Secrets.

Initially it sounded like Pat Leahy, the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, was prepared to put the brakes on, but his last letter to Jeff Sessions suggested otherwise. We’ve already had hearings on immigration over the years, he said. Granted, not on this particular bill, which might, in substantial part, actually end up being enacted [...]

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Change?

Before you go further, skim this post from last month rounding up recent data from various polls on immigration. Almost universally, there was 50-60 percent support for a path to citizenship. A month later, Pew finds 43 percent. Hmmmmmm. Head for the lifeboats, Marco. While there’s still time. Lots of interesting data there. For starters, [...]

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Amnesty.

No worries. She says the border’s already “as secure as it’s ever been,” even though her department has given up trying to measure that. Marco Rubio recently claimed that 10 million new illegals would cross the border over the next decade if there’s no new guest-worker program in place. Maybe Napolitano could quantify border control [...]

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