One more immigration defeat

It's December, and the GOP losses from immigration populism are still stacking up. Robert Novak thinks it was a negative factor for Rep. Harry Bonilla in the newly mapped TX-23 district.

The loss Tuesday of the 30th Republican House seat, representing a U.S.-Mexican border district in Texas, marked another political failure of hard-line immigration policies.

Immigration was not the central issue when Democratic former Rep. Ciro Rodriguez upset seven-term Rep. Henry Bonilla, a rare Latino Republican in Congress. Bonilla, who supported a border fence while Rodriguez did not, lost border counties he previously had carried. He won Maverick County, 95 percent Hispanic, with 59 percent in 2004 but lost it with just 14 percent Tuesday.

A footnote: Six-term Rep. J.D. Hayworth lost in Arizona after stressing immigration. Randy Graf lost an Arizona border district where he made immigration his major issue. Six-term Rep. John Hostettler, chairman of a House immigration subcommittee, lost his Indiana district despite stressing his opponent's softness on the issue.

Except in safe Republican seats, hard-line, enforcement only Republicans are all footnotes now. To be fair, Novak himself says in his e-mail report that the loss was complex but was hurt more than helped by his immigration stance.

Texas-23: Rep. Henry Bonilla (R) was crushed in the special election runoff after receiving 49 percent in the first round on November 7. The reasons are complicated, and they go back to a controversial Supreme Court decision earlier this year demanding a re-map of his district.

For one thing, Bonilla was at fault in many ways. He did not spend enough money to get himself over the 50 percent mark on Election Day, leaving $1.4 million in his campaign account on November 8. Bonilla had harbored ideas of running for statewide office -- possibly a Senate seat if one opened up. The saving of money that could have gotten him the few thousand extra votes he needed to pass the stake on November 7 proved costly. He only turned out 60,000 voters in the first round, just half of what 50 percent equals in many districts in a midterm election. Part of this is because of the number of illegal immigrants in the district, but there were enough votes in the district to put him over the top in the first round.
Democrats also acted cleverly in the first round with a calculated strategy. They fielded three semi-credible candidates in the race in order to appeal to different parts of the newly constituted district, knowing that none of those Democrats would have a serious chance of a first round victory. This would force a second round race with just two candidates by law and no chance that Bonilla could win with a plurality.

There was little reason to believe that yesterday's victor, former Rep. Ciro Rodriguez (D), could come out on top after taking just 20 percent in the first round. But the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee carried Rodriguez, a poor candidate in his own right, over the finish line, driving a powerful early-voting operation in advance of the election. The Hispanic group LULAC pressed for three extra days of early voting, which helped Democrats. Many Republicans did not think Bonilla could lose and, therefore, failed to help.

Bonilla, meanwhile, continued running positive ads for too long after November 7, but then suddenly launched a series of ads that overreached in their extreme negativity, asserting that Rodriguez had ties to Islamic terrorists. Bonilla also focused his entire voter turnout operation on Bexar County, his home base of voters that had saved him from a strong challenge in 2000. But there just weren't enough votes there -- his vote total on December 12 was just half of what it had been a month earlier, and he lost by almost 10 points.

Bonilla was also slightly harmed, and certainly not helped, by his embrace of the conservative position on the border security and immigration issue. Once again, it proved woefully ineffective in bringing out white voters, and whatever-sized effect it had among Hispanic voters -- who make up more than 60 percent of the new district -- it was a negative effect. Bonilla lost counties in the second round that he had never lost in any previous election.

Hat-tip: ThreeSources friend Sugarchuck, who used to be thought highly of by JohnGalt.

Immigration Posted by jk at December 16, 2006 12:21 PM