How Steve King, Barletta, Sessions, Vitter, Cruz and Lee defeated amnesty

[RandallFan]

Last summer, House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) privately told the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference that if reformers won the August recess, then Republicans would move a bill in the fall. But the Syria crisis, the government shutdown and the botched rollout of HealthCare.gov consumed attention through the end of 2013. By the time Boehner released a set of immigration principles in January, Republicans saw little short-term benefit to tackling a divisive issue just as their midterm election prospects were strengthening.

Nearly all House Republican leaders blocked off time to meet with about 30 members of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference in Cantor’s conference room in the Capitol. Starting with Boehner, each lawmaker went around the table to stress the need to pass immigration reform.

Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) was mocked for hosting a rally against immigration reform in Richmond, Va., near Cantor’s district that drew only about 50 people. Images of the congressman standing alone under a gazebo at a public park made the opposition look weak, even a bit embarrassing.

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Govern...-the-final-economic-blow-for-American-workers

In addition to Brooks, Reps. Kerry Bentivolio (R-MI), Lou Barletta (R-PA), Tom Cotton (R-AR), Walter Jones (R-NC), Phil Gingrey (R-GA), Michele Bachmann (R-MN), John Fleming (R-LA), Steve King (R-IA), Ted Yoho (R-FL), Joe Wilson (R-SC), Steve Stockman (R-TX), Lamar Smith (R-TX), Steven Palazzo (R-MS), Mike Rogers (R-AL) and Jeff Duncan (R-SC), each signed the letter.

In January, King held a key piece of paper in his jacket pocket during the immigration discussion at the House GOP retreat in Cambridge, Md.

Scribbled on it was a list of about 50 names of fellow House Republicans that King considered allies, having talked personally to each of them and urged them to speak out against immigration reform. Now, he would need every one of them as the GOP leadership introduced principles that included legalization for most undocumented immigrants.

Many of the 50 had cycled through a series of meetings that King and Rep. Lou Barletta (R-Pa.) began in February 2013, when King became convinced that an overhaul was coming.

The reason for the early meetings was simple: Nearly half of House Republicans were either freshmen or sophomores who weren’t around for the last major immigration fight in 2007. With some key exceptions, these lawmakers were blank slates on immigration policy.

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“Well, that sounds good on the campaign trail, but few of them had actually read data about we admit a million on a path to citizenship every year, we have 600,000 guest workers in addition every year,” Sessions continued. “Few of them had asked themselves, in a time of high unemployment and slow growth, you want to increase the number?”

House members tried to meet weekly when they were in Washington, usually in King’s office but sometimes in other Hill locations to strategize their foes’ next move. When aides met, they would pore over the polling and studies available to make their case, and figure out how to loop in outside allies, such as talk-radio hosts.
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Sessions and Sen. David Vitter (R-La.) were the most active senators, while Sens. Mike Lee (R-Utah) and Ted Cruz (R-Texas) played supporting roles. Key House lawmakers included King and Reps. Mo Brooks (R-Ala.), Lamar Smith (R-Texas), John Fleming (R-La.), Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) and Louie Gohmert (R-Texas), among several others, according to lawmakers and aides involved.
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But after conservatives whipped up paranoia that any small-bore House immigration bill could be negotiated with the sweeping Senate bill, Boehner said last November there would be no such formal House-Senate conference.

Before the retreat, Sessions and his aides delivered a 30-page memo to every House Republican office — both digital and hard-copy versions. In it, Sessions outlined what he called the “negative impact” that current immigration plans would exert on “American workers, taxpayers and the rule of law.”

Rush Limbaugh railed against legal status as “the end of the Republican Party. Why would they preside over their own demise?” Laura Ingraham warned that Republicans who backed it “are in violation of their oath of office.”

Boehner’s challenge has been the small circle of immigration hard-liners who could effectively derail any reform bill from passing the House without significant buy-in from Democrats.

Diaz-Balart had not shown a bill to his colleagues. But the Republican never had a chance to make the pitch to leadership because of a dramatic twist nobody ever considered that helped kill reform: Cantor lost.

“We should’ve focused on the [Raul] Labradors, the Cantors back then, when there was more momentum, more encouraging pressure.”

And a majority of Senate Republicans voted against the legislation — a key number that the bill’s opponents used to their advantage.

‏@SteveKingIA #Gof8 #NoAmnesty #Gangof8 Bill passes Senate. 70% of Republican Senators voted NO, which in House means NO momentum for Amnesty, even w/BS.

https://twitter.com/SteveKingIA/status/350355238202519553

http://www.politico.com/story/2014/06/how-immigration-reform-died-108374.html