Immigration Watch International

The Democrats are uniting behind new messaging on immigration reform. Having acknowledged that the immigration restrictionists are dominating the immigration debate, the Democratic Party and its allies are desperately seeking to reframe the immigration crisis. Their new language about immigration policy -”nation of laws,” “rule of law,” and “required legal status”- is popping up everywhere, from the pronouncements of immigrant-rights groups to the Democratic Party platform.

With new language, they hope to win popular, bipartisan support for immigration reform in their own terms. It’s a message that is shaped by in-house polls and political calculation. The party doesn’t back away from comprehensive immigration reform that includes legalization for illegal immigrants. As if by rote, it includes the standard language about America being “a nation of immigrants.” But the party also strikes a harsher stance than in the past. Trying to please all tendencies, the Democrats say that immigration reform should be “tough, practical, and humane.”

Instead of offering an “earned path to citizenship,” as it has in the past, the party is now proclaiming that illegal immigrants will be required to obey the law-with the emphasis on the verb “require.”

“For the millions living here illegally but otherwise playing by the rules, we must require them to come out of the shadows and get right with the law,” states the party’s platform. “We support a system that requires undocumented immigrants who are in good standing to pay a fine, pay taxes, learn English, and go to the back of the line for the opportunity to become citizens.”

The “get right with the law” framing is also evident in the recent shift of Democratic Party leaders and pro-immigration toward a dual vision of immigration reform. Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and other leading Democrats now echo the party line that America can be “both a nation of immigrants and a nation of laws.”

Several of the planks will surely please the pro-immigration forces, including: “We must work together to pass immigration reform in a way that unites this country, not in a way that divides us by playing on our worst instincts and fears.” “We need to crack down on employers who hire undocumented immigrants, especially those who pay their workers less than the minimum wage.” “We also need to do more to promote economic development in migrant-sending nations, to reduce incentives to come to the United States illegally.”

But there is also new enforcement language not seen in previous platforms. The platform states, “We need to secure our borders, and support additional personnel, infrastructure, and technology on the border and at our ports of entry.” Similarly, “We need additional Customs and Border Protection agents equipped with better technology and real-time intelligence.”

And in a sign that universal employee verification is only a matter of time, the platform committee acknowledges that if employers are to be sanctioned for their hiring practices, then “employers need a method to verify whether their employees are legally eligible to work in the United States, and will ensure that our system is accurate, fair to legal workers, safeguards people’s privacy, and cannot be used to discriminate against workers.”

The Democratic Party is determined to gain the full support of the Latino community. It is sponsoring or supporting massive voter registration and voter education campaigns among Latinos and especially the immigrant community. It is, therefore, unwilling to touch the politically sensitive issue of further limiting family reunification visas.

As the platform committee states: “We should fix the dysfunctional immigration bureaucracy that hampers family reunification, the cornerstone of our immigration policy for years. Given the importance of both keeping families together and supporting American businesses, we will increase the number of immigration visas for family members of people living here …”

It’s a platform that is strikingly different than the 2000 and 2004 immigration platforms in its new “rule of law” posture, although it retains some of the immigrant-centered positions. In 2004, in a nod to the then-reigning security framework of the war on terrorism, the party promised as it worked to ensure that undocumented immigrants “have a path to earn full participation in America … we will work with our neighbors to strengthen our security so we are safer from those who would come here to harm us.”

In 2000, the party said, “Family reunification should continue to be the cornerstone of our legal immigration system.” And “we support restoration of basic due process protections, so that immigrants are no longer subject to deportation for minor offenses and are eligible to receive safety net services supported by their tax dollars.”

Central to the new Democratic framing is the concept of requiring immigrants to “get right with the law” rather than offering them a “pathway to citizenship.” Where did this new language come from? Apparently from two progressive Beltway institutes close to the Democratic Party: Center for American Progress and America’s Voice. These two organizations floated the “required” language in a few polls to determine how the party and immigration advocates should parse the immigration issue.

What’s the number one goal of Americans with respect to the issue of illegal immigration? In their report “Winning the Immigration Issue: Requiring Legal Status for Illegal Immigrants,” the pollsters state: “Hispanic and non-Hispanic voters agree that the most important goal in dealing with illegal immigration is to require illegal immigrants to become legal.”

In addition to the “required” wording, the two other key elements of the Democratic Party messaging, according to the polling results, are:

“The ‘required legal status’ proposal finds strong support provided there are conditions: paying taxes, learning English, passing a criminal background check, and going to the back of the citizenship line.”

“Focus on the role of employers. Democrats should favor strong enforcement not only at the border, but also in the workplace. The public believes the main cause of illegal immigration is that employers hire undocumented workers.”

The focus on requiring immigrants to become legal or face deportation if they fail to register gives Democrats a tough, seamless message about getting the immigration system under control and having respect for the rule of law,” said the pollsters.

Headed by Stan Greenberg of Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research, the pollsters observed: “Historically, the Democratic immigration message focused on providing an ‘earned path to citizenship,’ but this approach has no more appeal than a deportation agenda. However, the idea of requiring illegal immigrants to become legal generates a sharply different response. Nearly nine in ten voters favor a proposal to ‘require illegal immigrants to become legal, obey U.S. laws, pay taxes, or face deportation …’”

The polling report recommends the following as a concise summary of the party’s position-a position largely reflected in the party’s platform:

“We must be tough and smart to get our immigration system under control. It is unacceptable to have 12 million people in our country living outside the legal system. We must secure the border but we must also require illegal immigrants to register and become legal, pay their taxes, learn English, and pass criminal background checks. Those who have a criminal record or refuse to register should be sent home.”