Two Mislabeled Caucuses

On Wednesday, Townhall reported that Mayra Flores (R-TX) was prevented from joining the Congressional Hispanic Caucus (CHC). Also, Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL) was prevented from joining the Congressional Black Caucus last year. According to their ethnicity, both of these Congressmen should have been members of their respective caucuses.

The article reports:

According to those familiar with the situation, Flores requested to join CHC in early October and was rejected shortly thereafter. Flores is not only first Mexican-born woman to serve in Congress, but she also represents a district along the U.S.-Mexico border that is overwhelmingly Latino. CHC used to have Republicans members but they went on to create the Congressional Hispanic Conference as their own version of the CHC in the 2000s.

The CHC’s website websites states the Caucus “addresses national and international issues and crafts policies that impact the Hispanic community. The function of the Caucus is to serve as a forum for the Hispanic Members of Congress to coalesce around a collective legislative agenda.”

The website does not state in its “About” section that only Democrats can join the organization.

“As the first Mexican-born Congresswoman to serve in the U.S. House of Representatives, I thought joining the Congressional Hispanic Caucus would be a constructive way to build bridges and work in a bipartisan manner on behalf of our constituents. I was wrong. This denial once again proves a bias towards conservative Latinas that don’t fit their narrative or ideology,” Flores told Townhall.

Why bother to have a Congressional Hispanic Caucus or a Congressional Black Caucus if you are not willing to have everyone from those communities who have been elected to Congress participate?

Immigration As Seen By A Thirty-Something

Below is a guest post by Michael Daskalos, a young friend who follows history and politics very closely. The links with the paragraphs are the sources for his statements.

Trump wants a deal; and indications are that if you voted for him, you consider what he wants is pretty moderate by any reasonable standards. If you voted for him and are incredibly disappointed, it’s probably because you think this is way less effective than a reasonable and well thought out plan that involves more deportations, lots of rope and assorted other things best left unsaid…and that’s just for the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and its immigration activist allies. Let them run for office in Mexico, or the Knesset where they can have all the open borders immigration they want.
http://www.unz.com/isteve/drumpf-regime-attempts-to-deport-saintly-immigration-activist-white-collar-felon/

The sticking point is the Democrats vested interest—getting every single possible future vote out of this that they can get as fast as possible. Trump’s vested interests—getting re-elected and Making America Great Again are counter to this plan. As such President Trump wants whatever deal is made to have teeth and enforcement up front and concrete—just like people have been promised for years now. It is telling that when anyone asks for the law as written to be applied, they are called a fascistic racist white supremacist. If President Trump does not get guaranteed ironclad language, he knows he would have on his hands what most will instantly understand as “Getting Reaganed” wherein every state mentioned below gets the California treatment in short order.
http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2018/01/shock-report-3-6-million-dreamers-us-enough-flip-florida-arizona-georgia-north-carolina/

The corporate-paid-for class of professional Republicans are fine with this. Many of them are getting forced out or retiring from seats that are becoming “electorally unwinnable” (political euphemism for “your voters were demographically displaced”) or being voluntold by their donor handlers to take the money and run because they don’t fit in this new divide. This anti-Trump gambit supported by all the anti-Trump voices we are familiar with is attempting to give the Democrats the House and increase pressure for amnesty that way and feign the appearance that Americans support it. The anti-Trump forces are also aware that one of the first actions of a Democratic House of Representatives would be to initiate the impeachment process.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-42821505
What flashy titles for pieces like the one linked above are doing is taking a simple thing that’s well known: Trump is ok with a few DACA recipients, a micro fraction of the eligible “Dreamers” that might be useful and possibly a few hangers on that also attended diploma mills, a path to citizenship as a bargaining chip, and framing it for a particular audience. They leave out or bury the fact that the concessions on DACA are being made in exchange for teeth everywhere else in the deal. The reason President Trump is demanding specific language is so that it won’t or can’t be expanded by the courts later, as anyone with a couple brain cells knows will happen if they have seen the last year unfold.

Those articles are an attempt to separate hardliners and reasonable people like myself from supporting the president because he might not force as tough a line as could be imagined. The governing dynamic that has to be understood is that Democrats want every single illegal immigrant in the country currently to be eligible to vote in 2018.  That’s the starting position they are working from when they approach the table for any “compromise.” The wording is to be designed to wiggle as high a number of them into that possible, and as soon as possible, regardless of language that might infer otherwise. This fight is about language that will allow Democrats and their Republican allies, you know the names, the legal space to pull shenanigans through the courts with hand picked judges to make that happen.