US President Donald Trump Credit:AP But with more Americans still opposing the tax measure than supporting it, Trump's allies believe that trying to link Democrats to crimes committed by unauthorised immigrants and gangs like MS-13 will do more to galvanise Republican voters and get them to the polls in November than emphasising economic issues. "People don't turn out to say thank you," said Corey Lewandowski, one of the president's top political advisers. "If you want to get people motivated, you've got to give them a reason to vote. Saying 'build the wall and stop illegals from coming in and killing American citizens' gives them an important issue." A demonstration in front of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement offices in Miramar, Florida. Credit:AP This fear-oriented approach reflects the degree that Trump has put his anti-immigration imprint on the Republican Party. The same raw appeals Trump made in 2016 about immigrants illegally crossing the border have not abated among most of his Republican supporters.

And his supporters say the party has little choice in an election where Democrats are eager to register their opposition to a president they despise — and that the only way to succeed in a campaign driven by turning out the party base is to focus on what grass-roots conservatives care most about. "It's an issue folks are emotionally attached to," said Andy Surabian, a Republican strategist and former Trump aide. "I know that upsets some people in the donor class, but it's the reality of where the party is." Trump's anti-immigrant remarks are aimed at the conservative base of the party that elevated his candidacy and is dominant in red states and House districts, especially those with largely white populations. Teens who have been taken into custody related to cases of illegal entry into the United States, stand in line at a facility in McAllen, Texas. Credit:US CBP The Republican grass-roots were already hawkish on immigration, while the president's takeover of the party has further diminished its pragmatist wing. And while hard-line Republicans are a minority of the country's voters, the GOP cannot retain its grip on Congress without this bedrock of its base going to the polls.

The president's pugnacity on immigration took flight in 2015 when his vows to build a border wall drew an enthusiastic response at his rallies and soon became his signature proposal. But stoking fears about "the other" has always been appealing to Trump, going back decades to his early days in New York real estate. The issue of Germany and migrants has resonated for Trump for more than a year, people close to him say. When he thinks of Chancellor Angela Merkel, he is reminded of her difficulties with immigration far more than his clash with her at the G7 or any bilateral issues. The danger for Republicans is that the political map this year is sharply bifurcated: The most competitive House and Senate contests are taking place instrikingly different parts of the country. Teens who have been taken into custody on the US-Mexico border rest in one of the cages at a facility in McAllen, Texas. Credit:US Border Protection Trump's broadsides against Hispanic migrants, like his criticism of black athletes who will not stand for the national anthem, may resonate in the deeply red states where the battle for control of the Senate is playing out.

But such culture war attacks will likely alienate voters in the affluent, heavily suburban districts Republicans must win to keep control of the House. Further, some in the party believe that by pursuing a hard-line approach to families at the border — a policy that is deeply unpopular among independent voters, according to polls — Trump is handing Democrats the high ground on immigration instead of making them defend their support for less popular immigrant protections like sanctuary cities. "Somehow I don't think that putting kids in cages is likely to go over very well with suburban moms," said Whit Ayres, a Republican pollster uneasy about running on the culture wars. Ayres said his party should campaign on "the concrete accomplishments of a Republican-held government." People taken into custody sit in one of the cages at a facility in McAllen, Texas. Credit:AP "A fabulously strong economy, a record stock market, ISIS defeated and a world without any major wars that are killing lots of Americans on a weekly basis," he said, laying out the case.

Republicans got a lesson last year about the risk of elevating immigration in campaigns where they depend on suburbanites. In the Virginia governor's race, the Republican nominee, Ed Gillespie, thought women in vote-rich Northern Virginia could be won over with a get-tough message on MS-13, the gang with ties to Central America that has gained a foothold in the Washington, DC, region. But voters in suburban Fairfax and Loudoun counties overwhelmingly rejected these appeals, supporting Governor Ralph S. Northam with landslide margins in large part to send a message about their disdain for Trump. The unease with a hard-line approach on immigration is strongest among House Republicans who hail from diverse districts. Many of these lawmakers signed a discharge petition that would have forced a vote offering legal status for Dreamers, children brought to the country by unauthorised immigrants. And as Liesl Hickey, a veteran Republican strategist who previously ran the House congressional campaign arm, pointed out, it is Republican lawmakers like Representative Carlos Curbelo of Florida, Will Hurd of Texas and Steve Knight of California who face some of the most daunting re-election challenges.

"I think it's pretty clear that this is not a winning issue in the form that some want to take it," said Hickey, alluding to the hard-line approach. In a sign of the Republican alarm about the family separations at the border, Representative Steve Stivers of Ohio, chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, said on Monday that he would ask the Trump administration "to stop needlessly separating children from their parents." Yet some of Trump's advisers have told the president he needs to live up to what he promised voters on immigration. These aides have told him that what he is doing is similar to what President Barack Obama did, and suggested that the news media is cherry-picking images of children that can be used to portray Trump's policy in the harshest of lights. Trump, absorbing these arguments, has related to allies that he thinks he is being mistreated by the media and sought to shift the conversation to the broader immigration debate. But Democrats believe he is making a costly mistake by taking his rhetoric too far. "He has taken an issue that is a decent wedge in swing places for Republicans and turned it into this preposterous notion that Democrats are responsible for family separation, Democrats are responsible for all immigrant crime, and Democrats are responsible for MS-13," said Anna Greenberg, a Democratic pollster. "Nobody believes that."

New York Times