Dec.19

electoral-vote.com

Dem 51

   

GOP 49

Immigration 2024, Part I: It's NOT the Economy, Stupid

We know from history that the state of the economy affects a lot of votes, but there is another factor that seems to be rivaling it, and not only in the U.S., but in much of the world: migration. Politico took a look at migration as an issue in multiple countries:

• U.S.: Donald Trump's victory in 2016 was largely built around blocking immigration from Mexico and Central America by building a big beautiful wall (that Mexico would pay for). This would solve the problem by simply physically keeping would-be immigrants out of the country. It didn't work out so well, but it was certainly a key factor in Trump's victory. Now Joe Biden is having to deal with it. House Republicans are refusing to provide funding for Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan unless Biden drastically cuts immigration. He is probably going to accept some form of this compromise. He has to pray that the number of Republican voters who decide that he is acceptable on account of this is enough to compensate for the Democrats who will refuse to vote for him as a result of any compromise with the Republicans.
  
  
• Canada: Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is being dogged by a pessimistic public attitude toward immigration, especially since there is no housing for the immigrants. Trudeau is trying to sell immigration as a cure for an aging population and more, but not everyone is buying it. Canada has absorbed 1.3 million people in the past 8 years, mostly from India, China, the Philippines, and Syria, and most of them (excepting refugees) have passed Canada's test for acceptance, which depends on what the immigrant can do for Canada, not what Canada can do for the immigrant. For example, Filipinos score high due to the many English-speaking trained nurses who are coming to a country with a nursing shortage. The people from India are mostly in tech, finance, and medicine and can find jobs quickly. Many of the Chinese people are rich businessmen who get temporary permits to allow them to form a company that will hire at least three Canadians, in which case they can stay. Only the Syrians are refugees. Despite their value to Canada and Canada's long-standing model of being a mosaic, immigrants are not popular overall.
  
  
• U.K.: Brexit was all about being able to block immigrants and not being subject to the E.U. immigration policies. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is worried that it isn't working and he will be blamed. Net immigration broke a record last month. That wasn't the game plan at all. His slogan was "Stop the boats," but they keep coming. His failure to stop them has ignited a firestorm within his own party. He wanted to send them to Rwanda, but the British Supreme Court struck down the plan. Now he doesn't know what to do.
  
  
• France: President Emmanuel Macron had an immigration plan but the National Assembly just rejected it. The plan was a compromise between what the left wants and what the right wants. Nobody likes compromises, so it sank. Now he has to try again. He had better come up with something better because Marine Le Pen's fascist party is going to attack him bitterly on immigration (mostly from North Africa) in the run-up to the European Union elections in June.
  
  
• Italy: Migrants come from Africa to Italy in small boats. Prime Minister Georgia Meloni wants to have an E.U. naval mission block them before they get far from Africa. She has been told that would violate international law. Her party is the direct descendant of Benito Mussolini's fascist party, so she is trying to craft an image of a democratic conservative and openly violating international law is not a great start. She doesn't want the immigrants but doesn't know how to stop them from coming.
  
  
• Germany: Immigration has been the big topic in Germany for months and is giving Chancellor Olaf Scholz a big headache. The problem is refugees from Syria's civil war. They are putting huge strains on not only the federal government but also the state and local governments. Scholz is trying to block them at the borders with Poland, Switzerland, and the Czech Republic. He knows that if he fails, the fascist party, AfD, will surge in the next election. Scholz is keenly aware that the semi-fascist PVV party of Geert Wilders next door in the Netherlands came out as #1 in the recent election.
  
  
• The Netherlands: Wilders feels that since his party got 25% of the seats in Parliament and is by far the largest party, he should be prime minister and be allowed to carry out his program of banning immigrants and maybe sending some of those already in the country home. He is primarily against Muslim immigrants. Currently, an attempt is being made to cobble together a coalition government with Wilders' party and three center-right parties, but they don't agree on much and none of the others especially likes Wilders. On the other hand, tens of thousands of Ukrainians have settled in the country since the war in Ukraine broke out, but neither Wilders nor the public has much of a problem with them as they are nearly all white Christians and mostly well educated. Also, most of them are women and children and will go back home when the war there ends.
  
  
• Austria: Austria's prime minister, Karl Nehammer, is also plagued by immigration woes. He has plugged some of the borders, but that is really in violation of the E.U. rules and sooner or later he is going to be called on it. As in Germany and the Netherlands, there is a far-right party that is doing very well in the polls and is strongly anti-immigrant. Elections are next fall and unless Nehammer can change public opinion quickly, the country will take a lurch to the right as a result of the migrants.
  
  
• Ireland: Ireland has a long history of exporting its own people, not importing foreigners. But a housing shortage and riots in Dublin after an immigrant stabbed schoolchildren in November have put Prime Minister Leo Varadkar on the spot.
  
  
• Spain: The cities of Ceuta and Melilla are Spanish territory but they are located on the African continent. Once an African has gotten into one of them, passage to Spain proper is legal and easy. The cities have erected high razor-wire fences and hired guards to patrol the border, but they keep coming, sometimes overwhelming border stations.
  
  
• Greece: Hundreds of thousands of migrants have arrived on the Greek islands in the Aegean Sea. Greece simply does not have the resources to handle them, nor does it want them. It has simply deported them without due process, which has gotten it into trouble with the E.U., of course. Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis claims that what he is doing is firm but fair.
  

In short, millions of people in poor countries want to move to richer countries, in some cases due to persecution at home, but often just in search of a better life. Vast numbers of people in the recipient countries do not want them and are electing governments that promise to keep them out and maybe even send them home. Will that work? If you think that can't be done, that is probably because you are not familiar with Operation Wetback, carried out during the Eisenhower administration. It consisted of 300 jeeps, cars, buses, and seven airplanes that were used to deport over 1 million people to Mexico, in some cases by simply driving into the Mexican Sonoran Desert, pushing the migrants out of the vehicles, and then heading home. (V)