Legal Commentary

McCain Ad Lies About Immigration

By TChris

Add one more misleading advertisement to the McCain campaign's lengthy list of lies and distortions. The McCain team is wasting its resources attacking Obama on immigration with a Spanish language ad on television stations in Colorado, Nevada and New Mexico.

A male announcer says: “Obama and his allies in Congress say they are on the side of immigrants, but they’re not. Reports in the press say that their efforts were like ‘poison pills’ that caused immigration reform to fail. The results: ‘No’ to the guest workers program; ‘no’ to a path to citizenship, ‘no’ to secure borders. The reform didn’t pass. Is that being on our side? Obama and his Congressional allies — ready to block immigration reform, but not ready to govern.”

This comes after McCain, during the primaries, disavowed the reform bill he once championed, saying he would now postpone policy reform until American borders are "secure". Does the McCain team think that targeting obvious lies to people who care about immigration reform will help him win this election? [more...]

[I]n May 2006, Mr. McCain complimented Mr. Obama for his “commitment to this issue,” and for “working to ensure this bill moved successfully intact through the legislative process.” Mr. McCain, however, said during a Republican primary debate in late January that if the legislation came back for a vote he would not support it because, “We know what the situation is today — people want the borders secured first.”

Obama and many other Democrats offered amendments to the bill. So did Republicans. Amendments didn't doom the bill. The right wing did.

Do you recall which party was adamantly opposed to compromise? Which party insisted on building a foolish fence before moving forward with any attempt at policy reform? Which party screamed "amnesty" in response to any proposal for a reasonable "path to citizenship"?

Do McCain and his deception advisers really believe a Spanish speaking audience will forget which party, despite having a supportive president, failed to enact immigration reform?

Immigration was one of the few issues John McCain could cite as evidence that he would work with Democrats to move the country forward if he's elected. Instead, he squandered his little remaining credibility on the issue by blaming Obama for a Republican failure.

Funny how the ad doesn't tell us McCain's current position on comprehensive immigration reform. He was for it before he was against it. If he's for it now, his base will howl in protest. If he's against it, he's undercutting his own advertising. What will McCain say when he's asked about immigration in the debates?

Full post as published by TalkLeft on September 16, 2008 (boomark / email).