Jordan Bruneau, a senior policy analyst for Becoming American Initiative, wrote the following op-ed for The Hill.
Even as a rallying issue for the core Republican base, it is unlikely that immigration is best. Among the top issue immigration voters, 75 percent were Republicans. Yet an internal Republican National Committee memo found that a mere 12 percent of respondents said illegal immigration was the most important problem facing the country. While the anti-immigrant rhetoric toward the end of the campaign may have driven up Republican turnout in rural areas on election night, these parts of the country are shrinking in favor of growing suburbs. The memo thus recommended mobilizing establishment Republican and independent voters.
Meanwhile, the immigration obsession of the Republicans seemed to energize independent and moderate voters. According to exit polls, white women with a college education, a group that has been especially turned off by recent White House immigration policies, voted for Democrats over Republicans by a margin of 59 percent to 39 percent. By a margin of three to one, nonwhite voters, whose population numbers are rapidly growing, pulled the lever for Democrats in an increase from two years ago.
Recent elections, including special elections this year, have not yielded campaign dividends and may have generated blowback for Republican candidates attacking immigrants. Outgoing House Speaker Paul Ryan even called the president before the midterms to beg him to lay off the fear mongering on the trail. Republicans cannot allow the retirements of Ryan and other Republicans in favor of immigration to symbolize the further degeneration of the party from pro-growth to anti-immigrant.
To have a chance to win back the suburbs, which will increasingly determine state and national races, Republicans should reach out and make common cause with immigrants over shared values of hard work, family, and faith rather than write them off as a lost cause. To demonstrate they have learned this lesson, the reported purge of White House officials after this midterm election should continue with advisers like Stephen Miller who feed the worst anti-immigrant impulses of the president.
Read the full op-ed at The Hill.