Illegal Immigration and America’s Two-Party Crisis

America’s national elections in 2014 were a significant turning point, as is our impending election in 2016. Our two-party system is now in jeopardy. The millions of illegal immigrants in our country constitute, politically, America’s current sleeping giant. This has seriously weakened the Democratic Party and set the stage for a probable Republican takeover in Washington. This seriously threatens the traditional balance of power between America’s two major political parties.

On November 20, 2014, President Obama announced his plan to grant amnesty to an additional 5 million illegal immigrants, while stating explicitly that his executive action was not an amnesty. I listened to that 16-minute speech carefully. His blatant disregard for the Constitution was matched only by his blatant disregard for the truth. But the truth came out nevertheless. Barack Obama has always been an open borders advocate as was obvious in December 2008 when he nominated Janet Napolitano to be the head of the Department of Homeland Security.

His proposed executive action has moved the Democratic Party into an extreme leftist position. The mainstream of American voters already anticipated this and in the elections of 2014 the Republicans picked up nine additional seats in the U.S. Senate, thereby gaining control of both houses of Congress. The Republicans are now well positioned to capture the White House in 2016 as well. As a lifelong, liberal Democrat I regard this trend as ominous, because the Republicans could soon dismantle the Affordable Care Act, permit numerous assaults upon America’s environment, and continue their generic indifference to America’s poor and middle class.

America’s major Democratic leaders, such as Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Chuck Schumer, Elizabeth Warren and others, have blindly followed Obama’s disastrous immigration policies into this extreme leftist position. This polarization reminds me of the 1980s when, under Ronald Reagan, the extreme right wing of the Republican Party gained control of the Republican Party.

This same phenomenon is occurring in America now, except the political pendulum has swung to the other side. Today the extreme left-wing of the Democratic Party has gained control of the party as a whole. Why are so many national Democratic leaders silent about the absolute insanity and absurdity of another generic amnesty as being promoted by Obama? Being led like sheep they also have contributed to this political suicide. Some leading Republicans have acquiesced to Obama’s position, but in fewer numbers.

Obama’s amnesty is not immigration reform. It is a brazen attempt to sell a policy that has already failed miserably before. The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 (IRCA) granted amnesty to 2.7 million illegal immigrants. Many critics warned then that IRCA was a huge mistake. Time has proven them correct.

Today, Barack Obama’s Audacity of Hope has turned into the hope of audacity. He is hoping that his audacious and unconstitutional executive action will somehow succeed. Americans must rally to prevent our country from being overrun and overpopulated from the chaos of nonenforcement. Our immigration system needs real reform, not the false reform that Obama has been promoting all along.

As a commonsense, liberal Democrat I feel my own anguish and despair that the leaders of my party have abandoned the principle of law when it comes to immigration law. When we abandon the principle of law, we abandon America. Since the Democratic Party has become the party of open borders, I can no longer support it. Whether or not I, and millions of other Democrats, will vote Republican in 2016 is now my biggest question.