WASHINGTON (By Billy House and Mike Madden, Arizona Republic) April 22, 2006 — Snubbed as a major issue in the race for the White House two years ago, immigration reform is now a hot topic for presidential hopefuls in the 2008 campaign.

The issue may even become polarizing enough to generate a third-party candidacy for the White House, according to some analysts.

"It's already figuring very prominently in presidential calculations," said Ross Baker, a political science professor at Rutgers University. "Potential candidates are wondering, 'How do I play it? What kind of (political) spin can I get on it?' It's keeping people up at night.

 

"Immigration is going to have enormous impact on 2008."

And although immigration reform may not yet register amid the top voter concerns in most nationwide polling, that is changing.

It is rapidly becoming a symbol for a list of potential voter concerns in 2008, including the economy, tolerance and legal issues, said Lee Miringoff, director of the Marist College Institute for Public Opinion in Poughkeepsie, N.Y.

Two years ago, President Bush and Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry a Massachusetts senator, paid scant attention to the issue in their presidential campaigns.

"I don't think either side understood just how critical an issue it was, especially in places like Arizona," said Douglas Wilson, who was Arizona chairman of the Kerry campaign. "The politicians now understand."

But as Congress has taken on the issue directly, immigration politics have been thrust in front of a national audience.

Lawmakers returning to Washington next week are expected to continue trying to hash out what to do, including granting legal status and even creating new avenues to citizenship for many undocumented foreign workers.

The debate has direct implications for the estimated 11 million to 12 million undocumented immigrants in this country, as well as state and community governments, businesses, law enforcement, and providers of health care and other public services.

Several potential 2008 GOP presidential candidates, including Sen. John McCain of Arizona, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee, Sen. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska and Rep. Tom Tancredo of Colorado, have staked out the highest-profile positions on the issue.

Among Democrats, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York has become more vocal, although she hasn't played a major role in shaping immigration legislation. Last month, Clinton lashed out at some of the GOP positions against undocumented workers and their support networks, saying the GOP would "literally criminalize the good Samaritan and probably even Jesus himself."

Tough issue for GOP

It is hard to know which party or presidential candidates in the long run stand to gain the upper hand in the debate.

But the issue may be causing the most concern for those now positioning themselves for a GOP presidential primary battle.

Many of the GOP's grass-roots conservative supporters tend to be most active in primary campaigns, and they fiercely oppose letting any undocumented immigrants get legal status. Complicating matters, the business wing of the party is pushing for some type of broad guest-worker plan.

"The clearest sign" that presidential politics already are in play was Frist's move last month, as the Senate majority leader, to force action on a border-enforcement bill, said Thomas Mann, an expert on government at the Brookings Institution, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank.

Border-security advocates had applauded a bill introduced by Frist just before the Senate began debating broader reforms.

But Frist then moved closer to the center by backing a bipartisan compromise plan co-written by Hagel, as did Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., yet another possible presidential candidate. Even that plan has sputtered, though, as Democrats and Republicans jockey for an advantage in the year's midterm elections.

"Quite frankly, I just think that that shows how quickly the ground underneath him shifted," said Frank Sharry, executive director of the National Immigration Forum, which advocates for immigrant rights. "He (Frist) thought that getting to McCain's right on immigration would be a good political move, and then I think he realized that ending up this year with no bill at all would be a really bad move."

McCain's stake

Presidential politics are evident in McCain's maneuverings as well, Mann said.

McCain has been courting conservatives who backed other candidates when he ran for the GOP presidential nomination in 2000. But his chief ally on immigration legislation has been Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., the quintessential liberal.

"The word 'McCain-Kennedy' is a flashpoint for conservatives," said Will Adams, a spokesman for Tancredo. "As soon as you mention that phrase, Republicans think amnesty."

At the same time, McCain's push for reform has left him the Republican who stands to gain the most from Latino voters, said Pedro Celis, chairman of the Republican National Hispanic Assembly.

The largest and fastest-growing minority group in the United States, Latinos have tended to back Democrats in the past. Their support would be a boon to McCain's efforts in a general election.

But McCain first must win the Republican nomination. And disgruntled conservatives predict that he may instead be punished at the ballot box.

"These elected officials who are insisting on a guest-worker program and diluting the efforts of border-security and internal enforcement are telling the American people exactly whose side they are on, and it's the wrong side," said Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R-Calif.

"The American people will now have that opportunity to make that determination, and they will. Senator McCain and others will find out about that when they find their own career short-termed because of the issue."

Rutgers' Baker is among those who believe that while McCain and other Republicans seek a political balance in the immigration debate, someone else could make tougher border enforcement the centerpiece of a third-party campaign.

"There is the potential that there will be territory (in 2008) unclaimed by either party: the hard line," Baker said.

Tancredo will not run for president if other GOP candidates take a hard line on border security, Adams said.

But the idea of someone launching a third-party candidacy is not that far-fetched, said Miringoff, of the Marist College Institute for Public Opinion.

That is because there are early signs that by 2008, voters, coming off the administrations of Republican Bush and former Democratic President Clinton will have a general "grumpiness" toward both major parties, he said.