Four Senators Who Deserve Our Thanks
Cornyn, DeMint, Dole and Enzi
By Bluey Posted in Featured Stories | History — Comments (27) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
Last night's defeat of the immigration bill came after three weeks of intense grassroots activism against the legislation. But this bill may not have gone up in flames had it not been for the craftiness of four Republican senators who voted with Democrat Sen. Byron Dorgan to sunset the temporary-worker program after five years.
The "poison pill" amendment was considered a deal-breaker by supporters of the bill. Having failed by just one vote on May 24, it came up again Wednesday; only this time, four Republicans who had previously opposed it voted the opposite way. As the Washington Post notes this morning, they realized that siding with Democrats was the only way to kill the legislation.
So who are these Republicans? Senators Jim Bunning (Ky.), John Cornyn (Tex.), Jim DeMint (S.C.), Elizabeth Dole (N.C.) and Mike Enzi (Wyo.) took a stand against the immigration bill and faced tremendous pressure for doing so. They held firm, however, and deserve credit for using a crafty strategy to sink the legislation.
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Four Senators Who Deserve Our Thanks 27 Comments (0 topical, 27 editorial, 0 hidden) Post a comment »
Somehow I don't have to look their votes up to know Senators Feinstein and Boxer went the other way though, heh.
But ehh, I'll look anyway. Boxer: Nay, Feinstein Yea. Wow.
Heh, OK, I'll drop Boxer a note and thank her :-) Even if she did it because she wants a permanent 'guest worker' program.
Run like Reagan!
Senator,
I don't know why you voted against cloture on S.Amdt. 1150 to S. 1348, but I want to thank you for doing so.
The whole country deserves the same kind of respect for the rule of law that California got when President Clinton brought Operation Gatekeeper to our part of the border in the wake of Proposition 187 and Governor Wilson's comeback win.
But this law with its expedited visa process was too dangerously close to an amnesty to be taken seriously from a law, order, and security perspective.
Thank you,
Hey, if I can agree with flyerhawk twice on RS, I can agree with Boxer's vote once, heh.
Run like Reagan!
I'm sending a very similar note to Claire McCaskill (MO). Not sure why she voted as she did, but she had a rather Republican-like quote in the paper this morning, indicating either a) she really believes the bill was not a good idea, or b) she received so many notes/emails/calls like mine that she feared for her political life. I wish for a) but assume b).
Claire McCaskill (D-MO) along with Jim Webb (D-VA) and John Tester (D-MT) are all newly elected freshman Democrats who won their seats in Purple States at least partially by campaigning against amnesty and to be tough on illegal immigration.
All three kept their promises which is refreshing. It is probably the last time.
http://www.al.com/news/birminghamnews/wire.ssf?/base/news/11812906485935...
Please add Jeff Sessions to the list.
HT: Polipundit
I, too, second the idea of adding Senator Sessions to the list. His speech early Thursday morning was magnificent and clearly pointed out the flaws in the McCain-Kennedy Amnesty bill. His characterization of the small group of Senators trying to ram through their legislation as "The Masters of the Universe" was brilliant.
Rudy
I have no Senator to thank for this. A word of warning- when Bush gets back from Germany, look for a full court press by the WH arm twisters to get each Republican Senator to back a new WH effort. Many of those who voted no are just waiting to vote yes on a plan much like this one. People like Susan Collins and Trent Lott. Don't be fooled by that hollow victory last night. We need a few Senators to offer a bill which says build the fence, add the necessary law enforcement and other officials to police the borders, crackdown on employers now, and put in place other measures to fully secure the borders. Only when that has been done will we consider what to do with those illegals already here. As someone said yesterday, let's stop worrying about how wide to make the front door to our house, when there are no sides to the house.
I thanked Senator Thune for voting against it. I also suggested that to fix this problem in the future, all they need to is pass and fund a border security and work place enforcement bill FIRST. Then after that is in place, they wouldn't get so much opposition to legislation dealing with those that are already here.
I doubt it will happen, but I suggested it.
"Wubbies World" aka: Brian; MSgt, U.S. Air Force (Retired): An argument is a sequence of statements aimed at demonstrating the truth of an assertion.
Jeff Sessions as my unofficial Senator, since my two 'officials' are turkeys--Specter and the other guy.
So, thank you Senator Sessions.
Jim DeMint was great, too.
Hell, yeah.
They that are with us are more than they that are against us.
Who are the Senators that voted against this bill because it was not liberal enough? I would hesitate in thanking those Senators because they will use that saying many people actually support an even more liberal bill on the next go round. I want to make sure they don't get any ammo for the next go round.
Ask not what you can do for your country, ask what your country can do for you. Washington Elected Elite
- Seven Republican Senators voted for cloture:
- Graham (R-SC)
- Hagel (R-NE)
- Lugar (R-IN)
- Martinez (R-FL)
- McCain (R-AZ)
- Specter (R-PA)
- Voinovich (R-OH)
May all receive the contentious primary challenge they've clearly earned and rightly deserve.
***
“Well, the trouble with our liberal friends is not that they are ignorant, but that they know so much that isn't so.” – Ronald Reagan
In Ohio he is known as Pop-Tax Voinovich because he tried so hard as Governor to put in a special tax on soft drinks.
Our other RINO senator Mikey Boy Dewhine was voted out last November.
I hope there is a serious challenge to Pop-tax in the primaries, because he will not get re-elected to the US Senate from Ohio.
Given his age, Voinovich might not run again. But I am deeply angered by his vote nonetheless.
By the way, didn't Sherrod Brown try to get to DeWine's right on immigration during the campaign? Unlike Webb and Tester, Brown voted for cloture.
I sure hope Voinovich runs again (even though I disagree with his immigration stance). I'm deeply worried about the politics in Ohio. I fear that someone with name recognition such as Voinovich is the only way to keep the seat in Republican hands. If another Republican emerges, then he/she must have statewide recognition otherwise I fear that the Democrats will gain this seat, because they'll run and win on how to prevent jobless from Ohio (even though they have no clue how to do this). Case in point: Sherrod Brown.
Yes,
Especially Senator Graham. He comes up next year, so Republicans in South Carolina should be working now on finding his replacement.
Rudy
political death, and I am not talking about the cheesy Steven Segall movie. I say punish the bastards. Or they will only try and screw us again.
"Nothing works like freedom, Nothing succeeds like liberty"
Kyle
Sessions, DeMint, Coburn, Vitter, Bunning, and ironically (but gratefully) Byron Dorgan. I called each of them today and did just that.
Frank Katz
We won -- again!
http://osi-speaks.blogspot.com/2007/06/we-won-again.html#links
With malice towards none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see right.
All 6 or 7 of Senator Boxers offices of Promotion were closed to faxes yesterday. ring ting ring
When you don't want to hear - turn off your phones says page 14 of the Senate Manual for Hiding From Constituents.
I think we would be better off if we follow the Senator Lott rules and go home for good.
I'm glad that sunsetting the guest worker provision killed (for now) the immigration bill. However the fact that this was a successful tactic reveals a disturbing attitude among a significant number of Republican senators.
When the guest worker provision was sunsetted, the "comprehensive reform" bill lost enough supporters that it could be blocked. Most of those Senators insisting on guest workers were Republicans. In fact even some Republicans who pulled off this maneuver actually support a guest worker program, but voted against it only as a way to block the rest of the bill which they didn't like.
The whole point of the guest worker program is so those interests who employ the guest workers can find workers at a lower wage than the market wage for American labor. This fits the Democratic caricature of Republicans as hostile to the lower class, or at least happy to shaft them for the benefit of more powerful interests. In this case the caricature is completely accurate (though it also applies to some Democratic senators).
I don't see any redeeming value in these Republican senators' mentality, that low-skill American workers are earning too much money, and the objective of our immigration policy is to manipulate the labor market to drive their wages lower than they would otherwise be.
Jobs Americans won't do? Only an economic illiterate, or somebody who figures his audience consists of idiots, could ever advance such an inane argument.
What they really mean is that the American market wage for workers to fill those jobs is higher than the employer wants to pay. Most Americans don't consider depressing low-skill wages a good basis for immigration policy, just to please some dinosaur businesses that can't compete for low-skill workers against other employers offering more attractive jobs (more attractive for higher wages and/or more pleasant working conditions).
No one has said much about the debacle of the Immigration Bill on Senator McCain's Presidential campaign. I, for one, believe it is the end of his campaign. He has demonstrated, once and for all, that he is a RINO of the first order and must not be nominated by the Republican Party.
I hope no Conservative would ever think of sending McCain a donation after his miserable performance of subservience to Senator Kennedy and his support of Amnesty for Illegal aliens.
May his campaign for President RIP.
Rudy
I know that John Thune, my senator, said he got over 700 pieces of mail (US Post Office type) and only two of them were in favor of this disaster of a bill. He got it too.
"Wubbies World" aka: Brian; MSgt, U.S. Air Force (Retired): An argument is a sequence of statements aimed at demonstrating the truth of an assertion.