The images in this article of migrants literally walking through an opening in the border wall will haunt Biden and other moderate Democrats this fall. Particularly as the administration is following a worst of both worlds strategy. Doing little to stem the tide of illegal and dangerous migrant crossings at the southern border while also keeping kids in cages on this side of the border. He has to change course or we risk losing purple seats all over the country.
Personally I’m for more immigration. I teach in a school that is about 25% newly arrived immigrant and 70% first generation American, and these kids are the hardest working, most entrepreneurial, most patriotic Americans you will ever meet. They are the backbone of my speech and debate team which just competed at the state finals. Many form the backbone of our JROTC program, and our biggest competitor in that program is Lawrence which is another district with a high Hispanic population. One of their alumni was tragically one of the last Americans killed in Afghanistan and the daughter of immigrants. I’m married to naturalized American who came here when she was eight and changed the course of my life.
So I want more people to come here and America needs them to, but completing the wall or a similar border security system takes the issue of border security off the table in the fall and preserves the Democratic majority. It is not that different from the compromise President Obama once favored and passed by a bipartisan majority in the Senate. Heavier security at the border in exchange for a path to citizenship for the folks already here. That seems like a much better bargain than only a wall or open borders, which is the false choice congressional Democrats are forcing on swing voters today. They will ultimately vote for only a Wall and Speaker McCarthy, Majority Leader McConnell, and President Trump or DeSantis is a scary prospect for immigrants and citizens alike.
—
Please share widely!
I invite you to consider an alternative approach: Actively welcoming immigrants as new citizens (and voters).
The premise that a relative handful of people can have any substantive negative impact on the nation or, for that matter, on any state is just another pernicious white supremacist lie.
Tens of millions of refugees from Ukraine are flooding Europe — and the US has agreed to accept literally a handful.
I suggest that a better plan is to fully embrace Mr. Abbott’s plan to bus immigrants to Washington DC. I suggest that the US provide federal subsidies so that any immigrant can go to whatever state they choose.
That program should entail something like the following:
Something similar should be offered for Ukrainian refugees — on a MUCH larger scale. Let’s call that our “Ukrainian Welcome Program”.
Here’s my suggestion about how to establish the appropriate scale of the Ukrainian Welcome Program: The US share of the total number Ukrainian refugees should be approximately the same as the US share of the total military assistance provided to the warring nations of Europe.
The US has long been the dominant military spender in Europe. The flood of refugees fleeing a war-torn nation is a predicted and predictable consequence of our participation in that war. The US therefore has an obligation to welcome our share of the refugees created by that war.
I am in no way arguing against the US leading the way in the defense of Ukraine (or anybody else) against Russian invasion. I am simply stating that a necessary component of that defense is welcoming the resulting refugees created by that war.
America and Americans MUST face realities that our politicians and mainstream media actively and effectively deny:
I think welcoming immigrants, making them voters, and prominently stating our party’s role in doing so is a better way forward.
Ironically considering his xenophobic history, Paul LePage is proposing to do just that in his run for the GOP governors race up there. I think fully securing the border on both ends and creating a fast track green card and citizenship process for those who pass criminal background checks makes sense. Some kind of lottery or voucher program to get them to the places that need them most, especially those parts of the country losing population.
I was actually kinda glad to see one of my advisees move to Winchedon, although I do miss her positive presence in my class, mainly since she will likely get a better opportunity for her and her family out there since Revere is becoming unaffordable and Winchedon will gain a smart young hardworking Latina who will contribute to their school and hopefully their community once she is an adult. She could also commute to Fitchburg, MCC, or one of the Worcester area state colleges and save her family money. That’s the part of our state losing population and to a degree losing hope. Revere is becoming unaffordable and our school is overcrowded, so more communities welcoming students like her will be a win win.
I’m all for this, I think most people would be for making legal immigration easier and illegal immigration harder-especially the immigrants themselves!
Framing it that way is the politically
Smart way to go. And absolutely lift the cap on refugees, and not just from Ukraine.
I feel like this story has faded into the background. Every once in a while a right-winger complains about how horribly Biden is handling this, but we don’t hear about it every day like we did during the previous administration. Are there really still loads of people pressing against our southern border?
Democrats need to get tough on crime. They need to remove the “Biden
s Border Crisis” narrative from Fox news. The alternative is to loose in 2022 and 2024…and allow the criminals to take over, ironically….
We ARE tough on crime, except for a handful of Squad types who won’t play ball. I don’t know how to rein them in.
The “tough on crime” canard is just a dog-whistle for racism and xenophobia.
As Christopher observers, we ARE tough on crime.
At the moment, our prisons are bursting at the seams because we incarcerate such a percentage Americans — especially black Americans. The GOP privatized prisons and thus made it profitable to put people in jail. The overwhelming majority of our prison population is comprised of non-violent blacks imprisoned for drug offenses — the direct consequence of racist drug laws that put blacks in jail for carrying the same amount of the same drug as whites, while whites go free.
The GOP has been promoting the illegal-immigrants-are-criminals lie for years.
There is NO connection between immigration and crime.
Then we need to convince the American voters that we are tough on crime.
If so, we need to prove that to the American voter.
What WE think of OURSELVES does not matter to the voter. It may allow us to feel superior, more intelligent. Maybe it allows us to look down on those who do not agree with us and denigrate them as poorly educated, racists, and worse…and if we think we can win an election without any of them? Well, welcome to Trump’s second term in office.
So what’s your suggestion for doing something we aren’t already, and that does not completely throw our values out the window? I’m not much for catering to the fake news coming from the other side.
We are not promoting ourselves as being tough on crime, are we?
As much as I do not like to praise President Clinton, he did manage to hold onto political power by coming down hard on “welfare cheats”, even though that tossed our values out of the window.
These are dangerous times and a retreat on some issues, maybe placing them on the window sill, might be a strategic move to hold onto the White House and USSC….
I’ve heard a lot about Biden’s crime-fighting and police funding agenda. This week he is also ramping up the fight against certain guns. I don’t know why it hasn’t been easier to portray gun restrictions as a key component of being against crime.
The biggest obstacle is the Media. Unlike Trump, Biden does not have a major media outlet willing to be his public relations team.
Again, liberals/progressives/Democrats make a HUGE mistake when they assume that there is a “liberal media”.
For as long as we’ve been going back and forth about Bill Clinton, you’ve been harshly attacking him for this stance.
I’m glad to see you acknowledge that it was smart and necessary. He didn’t throw any values out of the window.
Bill Clinton saw that urban community leaders were requesting the very same thing that right-wing Republican voters were demanding — more cops, more police spending, tougher enforcement of drug laws, reducing gang violence.
The older I get, the more historical perspective I have, and it’s hard to argue he was not progressive for his time and in some ways, much more politically astute than his two Democratic successors in the White House, as much as I admire all three men in their own way. We need to go back to some triangulation on crime, the border, and education or we risk losing the suburbs we finally flipped in 2018 and defended in 2020.
The only rising talents I see who can maintain the Clinton-Obama-Biden coalition are Eric Adams or Stacy Abrams. The latter cannot win a primary and the former has to win he general in the fall.
Thanks for admitting that President Clinton’s values did not include a fair and just social safety net for the working class.
Sorry, not taking that bait
Fine with me. You admitted that President Clinton was able to slash the safety net without affecting his values. His values, as it seems, were to remain in office, regardless of the harm he would cause to the poor working class. Given the loss of political power he brought upon himself with grossly inappropriate behavior, he placed himself in a position where he had to appease the Right in order to stay in power.
This comment is utter rubbish — one canard atop another.
Then I am confused. In order to score political points, gain support of independents, and appease his Republican foes who were after him with an impeachment , President Clinton went along with Republicans and got tough on the working class poor, making it difficult for them to receive benefits.
Today, I am recommending that President Biden score political points, gain support of independents, and appease his Republican foes who have already announced they want to impeach him on his southern border policy, go along Republicans and get tough on illegal immigration and crimes committed by the working class poor…and you see one as acceptable and the other as not?
Apparently, yes.
President Clinton did not “appease his Republican foes”. He did not “get tough on working class poor”. Sticking a finger in the eye of your opponent is not “appeasement” — and that is exactly what Bill Clinton did about policing, the social net, and a host of similar programs.
President Clinton instead identified the common ground between the priorities of independent voters and the Democratic Party base. In so doing, he marginalized his Republican attackers as they deplorable hypocrites they were (Newt Gingrich’s affairs with women made Bill Clinton look like a choirboy by comparison).
Your groundless and relentless attacks on Bill Clinton echo the scurrilous and discredited lies of the late Rush Limbaugh.
Bill Clinton was arguably the best and most effective Democratic president since FDR. That success — far more than anything else — motivated the overwhelming majority of the attacks on him.
I thought you had come to your senses in the comment you offered upthread. I was apparently mistaken.
Joe Biden, like Bill Clinton, is showing that the policies that the Democratic Party has always promoted — especially towards immigration — are supported by an overwhelming majority of Americans.
Lawyers call your proposed strategy “Chasing your opponent’s argument”. It’s a loser, in no small part because your opponent is setting the agenda.
We do not need to prove we are tough on crime. We do not need to prove that there is no connection between immigration and crime. Both are simply lies. It’s enough to state — as we already do — the obvious. People who believe those lies will not be persuaded by anything we do or say.
The better strategy is to register, recruit, and turn out new voters.
Abrams has done that in Georgia but her model does not work in WI, MI, PA, AZ or OH. All flippable states that could vote for a moderate Democrat. I worry NH night go the way of northern Maine.
I’ll also add Amy Klobuchar as someone who has been aggressive on crime and aggressive on criminal justice reform. Another rising talent.
I don’t think the people of New York feel that way today. I cannot believe a mass shooter might get away with killing a dozen people n Americas busiest city.
I haven’t heard anyone blame the most recent subway attack on illegal immigration. The scanty evidence so far published offers little clues about the attacker or the attack.
I no longer find it even noteworthy that another crazy shoots and kills another batch of victims — the GOP has been working to create this situation for decades.
I think that the first step in understanding how to move forward is to accept that the first priority of Vladimir Putin towards the US for at least a decade is to create as much chaos, disorder, and distrust as possible.
Today’s GOP is Mr. Putin’s most powerful weapon in advancing that priority.
Admitting that the most important goal of today’s GOP is to create as much chaos, disorder and distrust as possible is key towards understanding how to best stop its advance in the upcoming elections.
I meant that comment more about the crime wave in NYC and other American cities. There needs to be a balance between funding expanded police presence in high crime areas while also holding police to higher standards of accountability for misconduct. I know this is the balance Clinton, Obama, and now Biden are pursuing, I just worry that our party is being defined by the vocal and visible far left rather than by the moderates and liberals doing the real work of making policy changes.
I completely agree that Clinton had the best political instincts of any modern Democrat and the rudderless Biden administration would do well to follow his post 1994 playbook.