Donald Trump's anti-immigrant hate speech is complicating the re-election prospects of many Republican House members who actually favor immigration reform, few as they may be.
GOP Rep. Robert Dold of Illinois, for instance, holds a seat in a district that President Obama won handily in both 2008 and 2012. Emmarie Huetteman writes:
About 59,000 Latinos are eligible to vote in Mr. Dold’s district, making up 11.2 percent of the electorate — a key group given that Mr. Dold beat Brad Schneider, a former Democratic congressman who is challenging him again this year, by less than 5,000 votes in 2014. That year, 7.37 percent of those who voted were Hispanic — casting more than 13,500 votes — according to numbers provided by Mr. Dold’s staff.
Schneider is challenging Dold again this year and he favors the “Gang of 8” path to citizenship approach while Dold's focus is on increasing the number of visas for skilled workers and students with advanced degrees. Frankly, that's not good enough—especially not when your nominee continually equates immigrants to criminals and promises to pour an enormous amount of resources into making life a living hell for the undocumented in America. The numbers are daunting for some 70 Republicans who hold seats in districts where the Latino population has grown by a percentage point or more since 2012.
In 164 of 435 districts, the share of eligible Latino voters increased by at least one percentage point during the past four years, said David Wasserman, an editor for the nonpartisan Cook Political Report who focuses on House races. Most of the districts that have had the most growth are held by Democrats, though 70 of those 164 are in Republican hands, he said.
Please chip in $1 to each of our 11 endorsees to help turn the House blue.
Wiping out most of the somewhat more moderate GOP voices in the House will have several ripple effects: the Republican conference will be even more anti-immigrant than it already is, making it even harder to get immigration reform through the House if Republicans retain control of it. That prospect will almost certainly further alienate Latino voters in years to come.
“There will be almost no pro-immigration voices in this conference if all of these members lose, and so that’s a big problem for the party’s prospects nationally,” [Wasserman] said.
Below is a list of some Republicans who have been backed into a corner by Trump's angry rhetoric:
California
Jeff Denham, David Valadao, Steve Knight
Colorado
Mike Coffman
Florida
Carlos Curbelo
Illinois
Robert Dold