Working Class Males, Democrats, & Illegal Immigration

MCDAC recently received a response to a fundraising letter it had sent out to Medina County Democrats who have either contributed to prior political campaigns, signed up to receive literature from Democrats, or who are otherwise engaged in the political process. The response said that both he and his wife no longer considered themselves Democrats and wished to be removed from the Democratic Party mailing list. The reason given was that Democrats are for amnesty for illegal immigrants.

Now, the person sending this letter is no right-wing crank. He has supported MCDAC in the past, he has been an elected public official, and is active in his community. The point of this entry is not to deplore the policies of the national Democratic Party, but rather to point out how the perception of such policies can affect Democrats in local campaigns.

MCDAC has not really done much on the illegal immigration issue, one way or the other. To the extent that this blog has posted on illegal immigration, it has been to advise Democrats not to try and end the filibuster over the recent immigration bill. Yet, this local Democrat has the perception that the Democratic Party is the party of amnesty for illegal immigrants.

Where is that perception coming from? Probably from news organizations like Fox, maybe from news reports, or from conversations with others, who knows? The point, though, isn't that the perception is particularly valid, the point is that it is out there and Republicans will use it in 2008 to villify Democrats and the Democratic candidate for President.

Such efforts, by the way, won't be limited just to Democrats running for President. Voters paint with a broad brush. They don't make fine distinctions between national Democrats and local Democrats, as shown by the response described above to the recent MCDAC mailing.

Democrats need to figure out now how they are going to respond to this attack, because it is coming. Thinking about it next October will be too late.