Immigration enforcement is a winning issue for GOP

Andrew Arthur:
A column in the Wall Street Journal this week underscored how important immigration enforcement is as an issue in the most critical races for the House of Representatives.

Titled "How Republicans Could Still Win", the opinion piece by Kimberly Strassel details the results of polling (which has yet to be released) conducted by data firm WPAi for the Club for Growth of 1,000 likely voters in 41 hotly contested House districts. That polling indicates that many of those races can be won by Republicans if they "have the courage of their convictions and get smarter in tailoring their messages to voters."

A key takeaway is the following:

Republicans have an opportunity in highlighting the left's more doolally ideas. Uncommitted voters reacted strongly against Democrats' calls to abolish Immigration and Customs Enforcement [ICE], and strongly in favor of GOP promises to defund "sanctuary" cities and states, which refuse to follow immigration law. These were top messages for those crucial suburban voters, who have watched in alarm as urban violence creeps into their neighborhoods.

As a whole, this is important information that you are unlikely to glean from most media outlets. The "Abolish ICE" movement has received a lot of attention in the media and been embraced by some key Democrats (as I detailed in a July 2018 post). That said, a number of pundits have warned that it may not be a winning issue for Democrats in November.

In particular, CNN Political Analyst Julian Zelizer warned in early July that "'Abolish ICE' is a massive political mistake." As he asserted:

The main problem with the abolish ICE stance is that the strategy shifts attention away from Trump and his hardline policies and toward the issue of government reorganization. In 2018, Democrats who are angry about the ongoing attacks on undocumented immigrants, as well as legal immigration, don't really need anything more to rally around. They already have Trump and his blistering rhetoric, and they have the extraordinarily harsh policy of separating children from their families — which, though the President has ended, still remains an issue since more than 2,000 immigrant kids remain in limbo.

The support of uncommitted voters for Republican efforts to defund sanctuary cities and states, on the other hand, is a story that is rarely told.
...
The abolish ICE position of Democrats will backfire on them.  It is a nonsensical emotional reaction to manipulation of the news about immigrants when over 90 percent of the arrests by ICE are for criminals who are to be deported.  The GOP needs to hang this position around the necks of vulnerable Democrats in ads showing the Democrats are on the side of the crooks.

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