Let’s go back to 2012. Mitt Romney lost. But it was NOT game over for Republicans. They maintained dominance in Congress, they blocked Obama from granting statutory amnesty to illegal aliens, not much changed in four years.

Now, a lot of #NeverTrumpers think that the same thing will happen again, and they can run a “true conservative” candidate in 2020. Assuming Republican primary voters will select a “true conservative.” Even if Mitt Romney can be considered a “true conservative,” in 2008 voters selected John McCain (a very moderate pro-amnesty Republican who made deals with Democrats) and of course this year they selected Donald Trump. Primary voters NEVER selected a conservative firebrand like Ted Cruz. George W. Bush was very conservative on Christian issues, but under his presidency we saw massive increases in government spending and government debt, stupid wars in the Middle East that in the long run accomplished no useful goal, and he supported the amnesty bill. The Republican primary process is not capable of selecting a great candidate. Trump is the best we are going to get.

(1) It’s hard to see how the Supreme Court remains conservative or even moderate after Hillary gets to select at least one liberal justice to replace Scalia, and who knows if Kennedy, who is 80 years old, can hang on another four years? Also, Ginsburg is extremely likely to be replaced during the next four years, and it makes a huge difference if she’s replaced by another extreme liberal or by a conservative.

With a liberal Supreme Court, the liberals can rule by judicial fiat even if Republicans control the other branches of government. We saw how activist the Supreme Court was in the period between Brown v. Board of Ed. (1954) and Roe v. Wade (1973). Expect that activism to return big time.

(2) Republicans will be utterly demoralized and there will be forces saying that the key to the Republican future is to agree to amnesty for Hispanics who are “natural conservatives” and will start voting Republican if only Republicans weren’t so hostile to immigration. I know it didn’t happen that way in 2012, but are you willing to risk that it’s going to be the same this time?

Democrats don’t merely want amnesty, they want amnesty with a path to citizenship, and if they get that from Congress, or if the liberal Supreme Court says it’s unconstitutional not to give them citizenship, then we are talking about 11 million new voters who I predict will lean more heavily Democratic than current Hispanic citizens. They may be poor and “uneducated,” but collectively they will remember which party had their back. I guarantee it.

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OldTimer writes in a comment:

Can we please stop trotting out this bullshit 11 million figure which has been static for the better half of two decades? Reliable private sector estimates say it is closer to 30 million, which makes much more sense.

If OldTimer is correct, then amnesty with citizenship would be an even bigger disaster for the future of the Republican Party.