By Julia Hahn
Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC)’s endorsement of Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) may shine an unwanted spotlight on the South Carolinian’s record of past radical statements on immigration and his aggressive support for donor class policies embraced by Sen. Rubio.
Gowdy’s extreme immigration declarations come in addition to his long-standing support for donor-class Republican lawmakers. For instance, in a closed-door GOP leadership election in November of 2014, Gowdy seconded Rep. John Boehner (R-OH)’s nomination as House Speaker. Similarly, Gowdy was the Congressman who nominated Paul Ryan for Speaker. According to Politico, Boehner “secretly urged Gowdy to run” for House Majority Leader.
At the height of the Rubio-Ryan amnesty push in 2013 — in the aftermath of President Obama’s profoundly controversial 2012 executive amnesty for DREAMers and at a time when illegal minors were continuing to pour across the border — Gowdy delivered a blanket pardon to the world’s alien youth to enter the country illegally. Gowdy declared: “When children wander into neighborhood yards, we don’t call that trespassing.” Gowdy elaborated on his position, stating:
What I prefer to do is look at the 11 million in natural subgroups. You have what are called the DREAM children. I would think most people would advocate for an accelerated path to citizenship for children who, through no fault of their own, were brought here at an early age. I would have a shortened path to citizenship for those who serve in our armed services. And then you can have a sliding scale [to determine which illegals get citizenship] based on your years in the country and contributions you made to society.
Gowdy’s prior statements on immigration won him effusive praise from Congressional open borders advocate, Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-IL). “What I think Trey has is a fundamental sense of fairness,” Gutierrez said, “Bigotry and hate are an affront to his core values. Once you can set that aside, vis-a-vis immigration, you can devise a world of justice and fairness. It’s clear he has a set of values.”
Gowdy has been equally effusive of Gutierrez in return. “If you listen to Luis, he sounds like a prosecutor, talking about respect for the rule of law and how to balance the compassion with the respect for the rule of law,” Gowdy said. While Gutierrez has previously declared, “I have only one loyalty… and that’s to the immigrant community,” Gowdy has said, “Luis is impossible not to like.”
Despite historic immigration highs, Gowdy has asserted that businesses—including prominent manufacturers—are suffering crippling labor shortages, even as record numbers of Americans are not working.
Gowdy has similarly aligned himself with Rubio-Ryan donor class Republicans by giving his full-throated support for granting President Obama fast-track trade authority.
Yet the absence of this deep well of prior Gowdy statements from establishment media’s coverage of his endorsement of Rubio, seems consistent with the media’s larger failure to grasp the full meaning of the narrative underpinning the 2016 election.
The running theme of the 2016 election has been the deep divide splitting the Republican Party. This divide emerges between a base that opposes large-scale immigration and internationalist trade deals, and a governing elite that is determined to continue and expand the mass importation of cheap foreign labor and cheap foreign imports.
Gowdy’s recent endorsement of Rubio seems to underscore that conventional labels of “conservative” vs. “moderate” are increasingly ill-suited to describe the divisions within the Party. Instead those divisions are better understood as a conflagration between populist nation-state Republicans and globalist donor-class Republicans.
For instance, Gowdy’s endorsement struck the media as a cross-over endorsement for Senator Rubio (i.e. a less “conservative” presidential candidate snagging the endorsement of more “conservative” lawmaker). This false dichotomy—in which Gowdy represents a cross-over “conservative” endorsement—is only possible when one either ignores or is unaware of Gowdy’s lengthy record of statements supporting donor-class immigration policies, which make him and Rubio a near perfect ideological pair.
Among those treating Gowdy’s endorsement through the prism of “conservative” vs. “moderate” is Fox News contributor and Townhall’s political editor Guy Benson. Benson writes:
Gowdy—widely admired as a principled fighter among many grassroots conservatives—will join Sen. Marco Rubio on the campaign trail in Iowa next week… This is a good get for Team Rubio. Gowdy is well regarded by the base… Rubio must be pleased to have secured the conservative Congressman’s backing, and to have boxed out his presidential competitors for Gowdy’s semi-splashy, potentially-impactful endorsement.
Yet Benson fails to disclose to his readers that Gowdy has made a series of immigration statements that places him firmly in the donor-class camp.
A review of Gowdy’s prior statements on immigration and trade suggests that he and Rubio are near ideological soul mates.
Gowdy Supports Cantor-Style Amnesty for So-Called DREAMers
In 2013, Eric Cantor and Bob Goodlatte were planning a bill that would grant amnesty for illegal immigrants allegedly brought to the country as minors. As Politico reported at the time:
Two top House Republicans are writing legislation that would craft a path to legalization for young immigrants who were brought to the United States illegally as children. Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.), the second-ranking House Republican, and House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) are working on the legislation, tentatively titled the Kids Act.
At the same time that Cantor and Goodlatte were pushing for a DREAMer amnesty, Gowdy leant, what could only be interpreted as, whole-hearted support for their cause. In a quote, which has been absent from virtually all reporting about Gowdy’s endorsement of Rubio, Gowdy declared during a 2013 Congressional hearing:
When children wander into neighborhood yards, we don’t call that trespassing. When children cry and yell and scream at restaurants or on airplanes, we don’t call that a violation of the noise ordinance. When children eat a grape at the grocery store or eat a piece of candy waiting in line before mom or dad pays for it we don’t have them arrested for petty larceny.
“Children can’t sign contracts, vote, purchase certain items, or even work in some instances because the law treats children differently,” Gowdy said.
Ironically, if Gowdy’s philosophy were put into effect, illegal alien children could vote in U.S. elections as soon as they turn 18.
The logical implication of Gowdy’s remarks — declaring alien youth should be spared from any consequence of violating America’s borders — is that these youths similarly should not be punished by being deprived of their parents’ company — thereby meaning that their parents will receive deportation immunity as well. In effect, Gowdy’s statement is an advertisement to all of the world’s could-be illegal aliens that you can violate America’s borders so long as you bring your children with you, and your child will be rewarded with citizenship and lifetime welfare for your family.
Gowdy’s declaration prompted swift condemnation from conservative talk radio host Mark Levin, who told his audience, “Many of you like this Trey Gowdy, right. You’ve seen him at the IRS hearing. He’s a former assistant U.S. attorney, I believe. Very effective, but sadly turns out he’s a RINO. Yes he is. Mr. Gowdy, yes you are.”
Conservative columnist and best-selling author Ann Coulter mocked Gowdy in a February 2014 column, placing Gowdy side by side with Eric Cantor and Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI):
Why are Republicans like Trey Gowdy, Eric Cantor, Paul Ryan and John Boehner making fools of themselves in order to spot the Democrats three more [electoral] touchdowns?… The once-respected Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., compared illegal aliens brought here as kids to children who steal a grape or scream in a restaurant… But in those cases [Gowdy cites], both the child and his parents had a right to be where they were — the yard, restaurant or grocery store — when the child suddenly behaved like a child. With illegal aliens, the parents are more like gypsies teaching their kids to beg and pick pockets. The parents forced the kids into being lawbreakers.
Similarly, Palestinians use their children to commit acts of terrorism against Israel, so that when Israel responds, the parents can wail, “They’re bombing children!”
(I thought only liberals couldn’t do analogies.)
Interestingly, most media reports covering Gowdy’s endorsement of Rubio omitted these conservative icons’ very public condemnations of Gowdy—in which Levin and Coulter respectively denounced Gowdy as a “RINO” and “fool” of the Democrats.
However, Gowdy did receive high praise in some quarters.
Luis Gutierrez found Gowdy’s position on the subject encouraging. As Gutierrez said in a recent PBS Frontline documentary, which aired in October:
There’s going to be a legalization component, and Gowdy said for those who arrived as children— I mean, if you listen to them, they’re obviously talking about other components of a legalization program… They went from the party of “We’re for enforcement only,” to “Oh, don’t worry, we’re getting around to the other part.” In other words, there’s good stuff coming.
Gutierrez and Gowdy seem to have a developed a close relationship. As USA Today reported in 2013: “In separate interviews, Gowdy and Gutierrez gushed about their mutual respect and trust.” USA Today wrote:
“Luis is impossible not to like,” Gowdy said… “There are people I agree with on everything politically that I don’t go eat dinner with.”
Gutierrez expressed similar sentiments.
“I think some things just happen because it’s meant to be,” he said. “The chemistry is there.”
The report notes that the two “hit it off almost instantly” after Gutierrez learned that Gowdy was not a “hardliner” on immigration:
Immigrant rights groups assumed Gowdy was a hardliner who would block reform. But Gowdy told the Greenville (S.C.) News in January he empathized with people who had left their country to find a better life in the U.S. He ruled out deporting the nation’s 11 million undocumented immigrants, saying such a roundup would “shock the conscience” of Americans. Gutierrez, a leading advocate of offering illegal immigrants a path to citizenship, was pleasantly surprised and predicted he and Gowdy would work well together. The newspaper story was the subject of their first-ever conversation on Capitol Hill a few days later.
Although Gutierrez had previously declared that his “only one loyalty” is to the immigrant community, Gowdy said that he would never question Gutierrez’s motives. “I’m trying to get to heaven,” Gowdy said. “You do that by doing what you think is right after you consider everybody else’s opinion. Luis and I could actually wind up voting differently, but I’ll never challenge his motives and he will never challenge mine.”
According to USA Today, “Gowdy said he once wrote a note to Gutierrez that said, ‘If I ever needed an advocate, a passionate advocate, I would want somebody like you.’”
USA Today reported that Gowdy described immigration reform as a “journey” that he wants to take with Gutierrez. “This is a step in what will be a longer journey and one that I will look forward to making that journey, frankly, with you,” Gowdy said.
“I do trust you,” Gutierrez told Gowdy. “I have reason to do that.”
“I look forward to the moment there is a Gowdy-Gutierrez proposal,” Gutierrez said, according to USA Today.
Like Gowdy, Marco Rubio has been a longstanding supporter of DREAMer amnesty. Despite campaigning in 2010 in opposition to amnesty and attacking Charlie Crist specifically for his support of the DREAM Act, upon arriving in the U.S. Senate, Rubio quickly began work on a plan to legalize so-called DREAMers.
In 2012, Rubio’s plan unraveled after President Obama went around Congress to unilaterally enact DREAMer amnesty through executive fiat (known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA). Yet, Rubio so strongly supports legal status for the world’s illegal alien youth that he has repeatedly said that he would not immediately revoke DACA.
In fact, Rubio has said that his “ideal” plan would be to keep DACA in place as he pushes Congress to pass a legislative amnesty: “The ideal way for [DACA] to end is that it’s replaced by a reform system that creates an alternative.” This is the same position as President Obama, who has also said that he regards the executive amnesty as a temporary placeholder until Congress gives in and codifies it legislatively.
Because Congress has repeatedly voted down the DREAM Act, in effect both Rubio and Obama are implying that voters’ decisions through their representatives to defeat the DREAM Act on multiple prior occasions should be overridden and disregarded.
Experts have explained that the DREAM Act principle—i.e. that alien youth should be exempted from America’s immigration law—effectively creates an open border. As former USCIS union president Ken Palinkas asserted during his tenure, this DREAM amnesty principle represents a promise of “perpetual amnesty.”
Legislators, including Cantor and Goodlatte, have suggested that it is improper to apply immigration law to younger illegal aliens. But if it is improper to apply immigration law to one specific group of illegal aliens, then why should we expect future illegal aliens in this group to be treated any differently?
“This seems like an argument for extending birthright citizenship in the future to include the foreign citizens of other countries,” Palinkas said.
Although Cantor did not go as far as Gowdy in likening illegal immigration to children misbehaving in grocery stores, Cantor similarly expressed the sentiment that the nation would be morally defective if alien youths smuggled into the country were turned back. Cantor declared, “One of the great founding principles of our country was that children would not be punished for the mistakes of their parents.”
This prompted Cantor’s then-primary challenger—now Congressman—Rep. Dave Brat (R-VA) to describe Cantor’s declaration as “one of the most radical pro-amnesty statements ever delivered by a sitting representative.” Brat wrote, “In what was billed as a new agenda for the Republican Party, Cantor declared that citizenship for illegals was required by ‘the great founding principles of our country.’ With this remark, Cantor declared his support not only for amnesty now, but amnesty forever.”
Gowdy Supports Rubio-Style Immigration Expansions
Marco Rubio’s immigration bill would have tripled the nation’s dispensation of green cards and doubled the nation’s issuances of guest worker visas.
As a result of a 1965 Ted Kennedy-backed immigration rewrite, which removed immigration caps enacted by Calvin Coolidge in the 1920s, the foreign born population has surged to today’s record high of 42.4 million—meaning that today one in every four U.S. residents is either an immigrant or the child of an immigrant.
Today, as a result of this law, approximately 9 in 10 green cards are issued to non-Western countries: Latin America, Asia, Africa, and the Middle East. Analysis from the Senate Immigration Subcommittee reveals that over the next few decades between 2015 and 2065, unless Congress pauses or reduces visa issuances, immigration will add seven new people for every one net U.S. birth produced by today’s population—a ratio of seven-to-one.
Yet Marco Rubio, Paul Ryan, and Trey Gowdy have all pushed for higher levels of foreign worker importations. The Rubio-Schumer immigration bill would have issued 33 million green cards in ten years—or 33 new immigrants for every one South Carolina GOP voter—easily canceling out the entire electoral impact of all South Carolina Republicans.
Yet despite these turbo-charged immigration rates, Gowdy has argued that even more foreigners should be allowed into the country. In a 2013 interview with nationally syndicated talk radio host Laura Ingraham, Gowdy—in arguing for changes to the nation’s visa programs—echoed the concerns of employers who claim that they need more foreign workers.
Ingraham told Gowdy that neither of Congress’ chief GOP advocates for expanded immigration—Marco Rubio and Paul Ryan—have been able to come on her show and make a compelling case for increasing immigration beyond all known historical precedent at a time when so many American are unemployed and are struggling to make ends meet. “Nobody has come on this show from Paul Ryan to Rubio on down and successfully argued that case here — none of them,” Ingraham said.
Gowdy told Ingraham that he would try to make that case. “Let me try,” Gowdy said. “All the guys you just named [i.e. Rubio and Ryan] are a lot smarter than I am, but let me try.” In explaining why even more foreign workers should be admitted on top of today’s autopilot visa dispensations, Gowdy cited the complaints of business owners:
I will go on another plant tour this afternoon. And Laura, I wish you would come to South Carolina and go on plant tours with me, and ask the very first question I ask: “Do you have any openings?” And the answer nine times out of ten is yes.
However, as a 2014 Center for Immigration Studies report based on census data found, the number of working-aged native-born Americans not working grew by 17 million between 2000 and 2014.
Ingraham pressed Gowdy on the question of wages for American workers. Gowdy replied by explaining that there are jobs Americans simply will not do.
Well, it’s not just “What are you paying?” It’s what are we as a culture paying people to do nothing. If you can make more money not working then that becomes a moral issue and it depends on whether your policies incent the inherit value of work… Look at agriculture. Come talk to my farmers about—look at the current visa—you have to offer it to an American worker. It is actually costlier to hire an immigrant and yet almost invariably the workforce is immigrant. Why is that? Why will Americans not pick blueberries, or peaches or lettuce? Talk to Jeff Denham in California. Asparagus is rotting in the field. I think there are certain jobs we just don’t bring our children up to do.
Yet a recent Buzzfeed exposé revealed how guest worker programs for agriculture have had a devastating impact on black American workers and has fueled racism against black workers in favor of foreign nationals who will work for lower wages. In an exposé titled “All You Americans Are Fired,” Buzzfeed writes:
Last year, thousands of American companies won permission to bring a total of more than 150,000 people into the country as legal guest workers for unskilled jobs, under a federal program that grants them temporary work permits known as H-2 visas… many businesses go to extraordinary lengths… deliberately denying jobs to American workers so they can hire foreign workers on H-2 visas instead… Companies across the country in a variety of industries have made it all but impossible for U.S. workers to learn about job openings that they are supposed to be given first crack at. When workers do find out, they are discouraged from applying. And if, against all odds, Americans actually get hired, they often are treated worse and paid less than foreign workers doing the same job, in order to drive the Americans to quit.
Buzzfeed specifically addresses the alleged abuses of some farmers in Gowdy’s state of South Carolina. Buzzfeed writes:
Last year, the South Carolina watermelon and blueberry producer Coosaw Farms was sued in federal court by black workers who allege their bosses told them “colored people just don’t work as fast as Mexicans.” The suit charges that Coosaw officials called its American employees “niggers” and made it easier for Mexican workers to meet production quotas. The farm also gave its H-2 [guest] workers access to nicer bathrooms, letting them wash their hands before lunch, the lawsuit claims.
During the interview, Gowdy also appeared to criticize Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) for not wanting to expand immigration rates:
Tom Cotton I think would be kind of the anti-Paul Ryan… Tom, whose a very bright young Congressman from Arkansas, kind of makes the case that you [i.e. Ingraham] made, which is do nothing. And in my conversations with Tom, I’ve said: “Ok, Tom, you’re a brilliant lawyer, make the case for why the status quo, which includes some crops rotting in the field.”
Gowdy went even further implying there’s a foreign worker shortage afflicting manufacturing plants. Gowdy said:
I represent a district that has BMW… [and] Michelin, make the case that our current visa structure is sufficient.
In other words, Gowdy is saying that the U.S. does not issue enough visas despite the fact that when Trey Gowdy was born in 1964, approximately 1 in 20 U.S. residents was foreign-born, and today that figure is rapidly nearing 1 in 7.
Gowdy has also been a supporter of the controversial H-2B guest worker program. The H-2B visa is used to fill jobs in maintenance, theme parks, construction, food processing, restaurants, and hospitality. When the program was briefly and temporarily frozen, Gowdy joined Rep. Raul Labrador (R-ID) and Goodlatte to praise the H-2B program and to “applaud” the Department of Homeland Security’s decision to resume processing applications. “We are happy to see DHS and Labor heard the concerns of businesses in South Carolina and across the country that depend on the H-2B visa program for reliable, seasonal workforce,” Gowdy said.
Paul Ryan is similarly a proponent of the H-2B visa. In defending a recent H-2B visa expansion, Ryan declared earlier this month that without more guest workers, many American businesses would be forced to “shut down because they couldn’t get the labor.”
However in his interview with Ingraham, Gowdy went further still to imply that it’s too hard for non-citizens to bring their spouses into the country.
Make the case that waiting ten years for a husband and a wife to join one another when the husband is a legal permanent resident, make the case of the status quo.
Given the unprecedented amount of exclusively family-based immigration stemming from Kennedy’s 1965 immigration rewrite, it’s remarkable that Gowdy argues that it is still too hard for family members across the globe to come together in the United States.
In 2013, there were 650,000 green cards issued in the family categories. To put that number in perspective, Trey Gowdy received around 126,000 votes in his last election. That means that in 2013 alone, the U.S. permanently admitted five times more family-based migrants on green cards — which confer access to welfare and eventually citizenship — than there are Gowdy voters in South Carolina.
Gowdy’s focus on the alleged difficulties of legal permanent residents—who are not U.S. citizens—to bring in their foreign spouses appears especially noteworthy in hindsight, now that concerns have been raised that it’s far too easy for people to bring their brides into the country. For instance, Syed Farook— the U.S. born child of Pakistani immigrants—reportedly met his jihadi bride on an online dating service, went on the Hajj with her, and then brought her into the country on a fiancé visa where they set about their terror attack. Interestingly, Rubio’s immigration bill would have expanded the fiancé program to allow non-citizen legal permanent residents to bring in their intended spouses.
Gowdy’s emphasis on the interests of non-citizens is reminiscent of comments made by Paul Ryan, who has similarly been showered with praise by Gutierrez. Interestingly, in his 2013 interview with Ingraham, Gowdy defended Paul Ryan’s decision to push immigration through Congress:
I do want to say this in defense of Paul because I have the luxury of being able to talk to him in the hallways when there’s nobody else around. I think he’s got a strategy that is more nuanced than sometimes what is reported, even though I don’t agree with him on everything. I’m a huge fan of his and I think his heart and head are in the right place.
In 2013, while stumping for Rubio’s immigration agenda, Paul Ryan told a crowd that it is the job of a U.S. lawmaker to put oneself in the shoes of foreign nationals and work to find legislative solutions to improve their quality of life:
Put yourself in another person’s shoes, which if you’re in elected office, that’s what you kind of have to do that almost every single day. The job we have — and what we do is we take different people’s perspectives. The gentleman from India who’s waiting for his green card. The DREAMer who is waiting. We take all these different perspectives… And then we come up with the answer to try and solve this problem. That’s basically what we do in our jobs.
Similarly, during the first GOP presidential debate, Rubio delivered the expansionist refrain about the alleged wait times for foreign nationals despite the nation’s historic immigration rates. Rubio said that the people who don’t get enough attention and “who never ge[t] talked about in these debates” are the foreign citizens “who have been waiting for 15 years to come to the United States.”
Gowdy Supports Ryan-Championed Globalist Trade Deals
Another area where Gowdy finds common intellectual grounds with Rubio and Ryan is his support of fast-track authority to ink international trade deals.
Gowdy was vocal in his support for granting President Obama fast-track trade powers. In fact, in a joint op-ed with Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) titled “Trade promotion authority fears are unfounded,” Gowdy denounced conservative concerns about giving Obama fast-track trade authority.
Gowdy writes, “While in the past TPA has been called ‘fast-track,’ this new, muscular version of TPA is designed very differently from past versions. It reins in presidential authority and places much needed oversight and scrutiny on any potential trade agreements.”
Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL)—who fought aggressively against fast-track, warning that it would have a calamitous impact on American workers and sovereignty—pointed out that this talking point was “ridiculous.”
Sessions mocked the Gowdy-Ryan talking point. If fast-track authority were to rein in Obama’s authority, “why does he [Obama] even want the thing?” Sessions asked.
Indeed, President Obama had been whipping Democrats to support a measure, which Gowdy contends would curb his executive authority.
“That’s, of course, ridiculous,” Sessions said.
This enhances the ability of the President to negotiate, it enhances his ability to create a new trade and economic union, and political union, throughout the entire Pacific region, it is something that he wants for that reason. And, it says in its name, Trade Promotion Authority. It grants authority to the chief executive of the United States to do more than he would otherwise be able to do.
Marco Rubio and Paul Ryan have been two of the most vocal supporters of internationalist trade deals and granting President Obama fast-track authority to usher those deals through Congress. As Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, Ryan was essential to Congress’ passage of fast-track. At the time, Politico described passing fast-track as “the fight of Paul Ryan’s career” writing:
Over the past several months, the Wisconsin Republican has worked — almost single-handedly, and quite stealthily — to build support to give Obama additional authority to negotiate a massive trade deal with Pacific Rim nations.
Similarly, in a May 13th address to the Council on Foreign Relations, Rubio explained that: “It is more important than ever that Congress give the president [Barack Obama] trade promotion authority so that he can finalize the Trans-Pacific Partnership.” Rubio also cast the 60th and deciding vote for fast-track.
Polls show that among the American electorate, Republican voters are the group most skeptical of free trade—with a nearly five-to-one margin of Republican voters believing that free-trade deals slash wages rather than raise them. Only a minuscule 11 percent of GOP voters, according to Pew, believe that so-called free-trade deals will be good for wages.
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Trey Gowdy’s record on immigration and trade underscores that while establishment media may try to put Jeff Sessions and Trey Gowdy together in a broad “conservative” bucket, Gowdy’s statements on immigration and trade represent the antithesis of Jeff Sessions’ populist platform.
Sessions has led the fight in Congress for immigration reduction, he worked with Donald Trump to develop the GOP frontrunner’s immigration platform, and he fought against the Rubio-Ryan push for fast-track trade authority. At a recent Alabama event, Sessions defended Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) from Rubio’s immigration attacks — warning that the Gang of Eight is gearing up for another immigration push:
This election is going to decide– did the crowd who pushed that bill, are they in the White House? And will they be able to continue their agenda? Or will somebody else be there who will say, “No.”
Less than 10 days after Sessions issued this warning, Gowdy, from the nearby state of South Carolina, endorsed the architect of the Gang of Eight immigration plan—whose candidacy is funded, in part, by some of the wealthiest backers and immigration expansionist in the country including Paul Singer and Oracle’s Larry Ellison.
One political analyst, who has keyed in the on the divide in the GOP between the Party’s base voters, who want greater protections from open door trade and immigration policies, is David Frum. In a recent piece, Frum suggested that this burgeoning divide has become an existential threat to the Republican Party:
The angriest and most pessimistic people in America are the people we used to call Middle Americans. Middle-class and middle-aged; not rich and not poor; people who are irked when asked to press 1 for English, and who wonder how white male became an accusation rather than a description. You can measure their pessimism in polls that ask about their expectations for their lives—and for those of their children. On both counts, whites without a college degree express the bleakest view. You can see the effects of their despair in the new statistics describing horrifying rates of suicide and substance-abuse fatality among this same group, in middle age. White Middle Americans express heavy mistrust of every institution in American society: not only government, but corporations, unions, even the political party they typically vote for—the Republican Party of Romney, Ryan, and McConnell, which they despise as a sad crew of weaklings and sellouts…
[Republican Main Street] rejected the hardening ideological orthodoxy of Republican donors and elected officials… [but] as a class, big Republican donors could not see any of this, or would not. So neither did the politicians who depend upon them. Against all evidence, both groups interpreted the Tea Party as a mass movement in favor of the agenda of the Wall Street Journal editorial page. One of the more dangerous pleasures of great wealth is that you never have to hear anyone tell you that you are completely wrong.
According to Pew, 92 percent of the GOP electorate—and 83 percent of the American electorate as a whole—would like to see future immigration growth curbed rather than increased. The polling data suggests that Gowdy, Rubio, and Ryan’s support for higher rates of foreign worker importations places them far outside the mainstream of Republican thought. Yet despite the data, one hill operative put it to Breitbart News thusly: “The clique running the show in Congress are the Ryan-Rubio radical Republicans.”
As Rush Limbaugh warned earlier this year, with Rubio in the White House and Paul Ryan as Speaker, in the “first 12-to-18 months, the donor-class agenda is implemented, including amnesty and whatever else they want.”
Breitbart News asked Gowdy several questions about his endorsement and the expected impact a President Rubio would have on the nation’s immigration policies. Gowdy’s office has not responded.
Read more at Breitbart.com