Le’t assume – because it’s true — that the “key funders” of the GOP all favor some form of legalization or amnesty for the undocumented (plus an increase in the number of legal immigrants). Indeed, they’re the main force pushing it on the Republican side. Nevertheless, Rubio badly damaged himself with actual GOP voters by naively duplicitously championing the funder-backed Senate “Gang of 8″ amnesty bill. So sorry for poor Marco! Such a promising young man. But Rubio’s fate didn’t really matter to GOP donors and machers as long as they had another presidential horse to back, which they did in the form of New Jersey governor Chris Christie. (Christie also supported the Gang of 8′s amnesty but more discreetly, with less blatant flip-flopping.)

Now that Christie’s damaged, though, the fatcats don’t have a horse. So eyes turn back to Rubio, and his possible rehabilitation. The last thing Rubio 2.0 needs–the thing that will stop his desperate repair efforts cold–is for immigration to become a salient issue again for Republicans. But that’s exactly what will happen if Speaker Boehner makes a big move this year for a legalization bill in the House.** Upshot: As long as Rubio is the fatcat’s default choice, maybe they won’t make such a push to get an immigration bill during Obama’s term. Christie down, amnesty down.