Voting Resources
Texas Republicans Have the Answer!
In June 2012, the largest state Republican convention in the country overwhelmingly approved a sensible immigration plank. It is known as the Texas Solution. Texas Republicans are no longer willing to kick the can down the road. They want Congress to adopt a solution, and they have offered an outline. Now Congress needs to act!
REPUBLICANS FOR IMMIGRATION REFORM?
Romney’s loss to Obama should be a wake-up call to Republicans that did not think immigration reform was important. Romney’s criticism of Gov. Perry on in-state tuition and “self deportation” requirement pushed Hispanics to vote for Obama. Romney got less than 27% of the Hispanic vote. Bush got 40%! Hispanics voted for Obama because they perceive Republicans to be people that look down on them and want to deport their grandmothers!
That message has long been promoted by groups like FAIR, Center for Immigration Studies, and NumbersUSA. These people are Spies in our Camp because they pretend to be “conservative Republicans.” They are not Republicans at all. Check them out and you will find these organizations are made up Planned Parenthood promoters, Al Gore earth worshipers, and zero population advocates! We have allowed them to divide Republicans with the immigration wedge.
“Hispanics are Republicans, they just don’t know it!” (Ronald Reagan)
This year alone 600,000 Hispanics (born in the USA) celebrated their 18th birthday. Over the next 4 years that equates to 2.4 million new eligible Hispanic voters. Republicans need to get behind sensible immigration reform now! Please urge your Congressmen and Senators to do just that. Encourage them to lead on immigration reform using the Texas Solution as an outline.
Republicans control the House of Representatives, and under the leadership of Congressman Ted Poe, Republicans can lead on real immigration reform. If Congressman Poe will take the lead, Hispanics will see that Republicans are just as serious about solving problems and creating opportunities as they are about protecting the unborn!.
2012 Texas Republican Party Platform
IMMIGRATION
The Texas Solution – Because of decades-long failure of the federal government to secure our borders and address the immigration issue, there are now upwards of 11 million undocumented individuals in the United States today, each of whom entered and remain here under different circumstances. Mass deportation of these individuals would neither be equitable nor practical; while blanket amnesty, as occurred with the Simpson-Mazzoli Act of 1986, would only encourage future violations of the law. We seek common ground to develop and advance a conservative, market- and law-based approach to our nation’s immigration issues by following these principles:
- Secure Our Borders – The U.S. Border must be secured immediately! We demand the application of effective, practical and reasonable measures to secure our borders and to bring safety and security for all Americans along the border and throughout the nation.
- Modernize the United States Social Security Card – We support the improvement of our 1936 Social Security card to use contemporary anti-counterfeit technology. The social security card will not be considered a National ID card for U.S. citizens.
- Birthright Citizenship – We call on the Legislative, Executive, and Judicial branches of the United States to clarify Section 1 of the 14th amendment to limit citizenship by birth to those born to a citizen of the United States with no exceptions.
- Create an Effective and Efficient Temporary Worker Program – A national Temporary Worker Program should be implemented to bring skilled and unskilled workers into the United States for temporary periods of time when no U.S. workers are currently available. The program should also require:
- Self-funding through participation fees and fines;
- Applicants must pass a full criminal background check;
- Applicants with prior immigration violations would only qualify for the program if they paid the appropriate fines;
- Applicants and/or Employers must prove that they can afford and/or secure private health insurance;
- Applicants must waive any and all rights to apply for financial assistance from any public entitlement programs;
- Applicant must show a proficiency in the English language and complete an American civic class;
- Temporary Workers would only be able to work for employers that deduct and match payroll taxes;
- All participants would be issued an individual Temporary-Worker Biometric Identification Card that tracks all address changes and both civil and criminal court appearances as a defendant.
Comments
"In June 2012, the largest
Correction: In June 2012, the largest state Republican convention in the country overwhelmingly approved a change to the party platform that will only further exacerbate the labor market competition between U.S. citizens and migrants.
Guest worker programs are not a good idea because they cast workers into a second-class citizen status and put their fate into their employers' hands, creating an opportunity to exploit them. It also encourages employers to turn full-time jobs into temporary ones at reduced wages and diminished working conditions -- something we're already seeing as a result of Obamacare.
To see why guest worker programs are not a good idea, we need look no further than the example set by Germany, the fourth best economy in the world. In response to a labor shortage prompted by economic recovery, Germany signed a series of bilateral recruitment agreements, first with Italy in 1955, then with Spain (1960), Greece (1960), Turkey (1961), Portugal (1964), and Yugoslavia (1968). The core of these agreements included the recruitment of Gastarbeiter (guest workers), almost exclusively in the industrial sector, for jobs that required few qualifications. Under the so-called rotation principle, mostly male migrants entered Germany for a period of one to two years and were then required to return home to make room for other guest workers. This policy had a double rationale: preventing settlement and exposing to industrial work the largest possible number of workers from sending countries.
Guest workers, unlike ordinary immigrants, were admitted under special jobs programs, and at least under the original plans, had no prospects of becoming citizens or permanent residents. Germany, like other European countries, at first refused even to allow them to bring families, hoping to discourage them from trying to put down roots. Later, Germany granted work stays of up to five years, and permitted wives and children to come along. Legal workers were followed by waves of family members and illegal immigrants. Sound familiar?
For decades, there were no efforts to integrate the newcomers. They were entitled to social benefits, but not citizenship. Their children could attend schools, but little effort was made to give them language skills. Many of the first generation of workers bought houses or established small businesses, although usually confining themselves to immigrant enclaves. Their German-born children were registered as "foreigners." They often spend years or even decades resolving their legal status. And, while Germany (and many other European governments) failed to seriously pursue integration, many immigrants were equally unwilling to shed their own languages and national identities. Sound familiar?
Many of the original guest workers are now retired, enjoying the comfortable pensions that are the pride of Europe. But their children and their grandchildren are trapped between two worlds, too Europeanized ever to return to the Middle East or North Africa, but lacking the language skills and education to forge ahead in their new countries. The parents took jobs that Germans didn’t want — and most of that first generation did all right. But the young people toay don’t even get the bad jobs. How are they to climb the social ladder when they can't even grab the bottom rung?
Immigration is not why Hispanics vote Democrat
Just read this disappointing article.
A good deal of key information about illegal immigration was not presented to the readers. As soon as the votes were in and Romney had lost, the talking heads were already ringing their hands over the fact that 70 percent of the Latino vote went to Obama. Their knee-jerk reaction is for Republicans to get ahead of Democrats on providing amnesty to illegal aliens. (Republicans should be talking about how to better communicate their principles rather than running away from principles like the rule of law.)
First of all, polls show that immigration is not one of the top issues of concern for Hispanics, legal Hispanic citizens who can vote that is. See the poll below.
Second, we shouldn't abandon principles like the rule of law simply to placate people.
Third, a Heritage Foundation study finds that the cost of amnesty would be $999 billion which is 70 times more than attrition through enforcement.
And fourth, if the country has changed beyond all recognition from the country we love (particularly if we have to learn Spanish to operate effectively in our own country), what difference does it make if a Republican wins the presidency or not? You can certainly look it up – and I think you should if you don’t already know – but my understanding is that 25 Americans a day are killed at the hands of illegal immigrants (murder, drunk driving) and that we spend more than $100 billion a year on illegal immigrants. Can we really afford to permanently import poverty like this? And are we protecting our citizens?
No one can predict which illegal immigrants will drive drunk and kill someone, which ones will bring criminal illegal aliens who are relatives or friends with them, which ones brought drugs into our country to pay off the coyotes who helped them sneak in, which ones who have children who will form or join gangs in our schools, which ones will take a job that an American would want, which ones who harbor diseases that they pass on to Americans, which ones will resort to identity theft, which ones who will further put our health care system in crisis, etc. Deporting people only after an American is killed or injured is not the answer and allowing everyone to stay certainly isn't the answer.
Immigration laws can be enforced and E-Verify can work. If it can be changed so that being born in the U.S. doesn't automatically make one a citizen and if the border can be demonstratively secured and if a significant number (millions) of illegals return home (on their own or by deportation), then I think you will get a lot of support for allowing a good number of the illegal aliens to stay legally without citizenship and perhaps some young people with citizenship. I hope you take this information into account when dealing with this issue in the future.
Hispanic Voters Put Other Issues Before Immigration
http://www.gallup.com/poll/155327/hispanic-voters-put-issues-immigration.aspx
Why Hispanics Don’t Vote for Republicanshttp://www.nationalreview.com/corner/332916/why-hispanics-dont-vote-republicans-heather-mac-donald#