When I ran for President in 2008, I had only one purpose in mind. I had no illusions about winning the Republican nomination, but I knew I had to run a campaign if illegal immigration was going to be an issue in the 2008 presidential race.

I succeeded in that goal. One by one, all of the Republican candidates for president came to agree with me that our borders must be controlled and our immigration laws enforced — that is, all the Republican candidates but one.

That 2008 candidate who never agreed to secure the border was John McCain. He never repudiated his sponsorship of amnesty bills — legislation that did not require securing the border. He has since cosponsored every major amnesty bill in Congress, including the infamous “Gang of 8” bill in 2013.

If you were asked this question — what Republican politicians have lied to voters while supporting illegal immigration and opposing border security, what name is at the top of your list? It’s that same 2008 Republican presidential candidate, US Senator John McCain.

Well, McCain is at it again.

McCain is up for reelection in 2016 but is facing a strong primary challenge from popular conservative state senator Kelli Ward. As usual, his answer to criticism of his continued support for illegal immigration is to lie about it, to hope Republican voters have short memories, and if that doesn’t work, try to change the subject. He’s all for sending American soldiers to fight ISIS in Syria, but not for fortifying our own borders — or halting Muslim immigration until we can screen out the terrorists among the migrants and refugees.

If you think we are exaggerating when we call McCain a brazen liar on immigration enforcement, consider this statement taken word for word from his current 2016 Senate campaign page:

Homeland Security and Immigration: Securing American citizens against threats, both foreign and domestic, is the primary responsibility of the federal government. This includes securing our nation’s borders and ensuring we have an immigration system that works by preventing terrorists and other from entering the country that wish to do us harm while maintaining a robust immigration system that welcomes the best and brightest in the world.

Really? He wants to “maintain” a “robust immigration system”? What planet is he living on? Does he really expect Arizona voters to swallow this?

Yes, those goals sound great — to someone who has not been paying attention to John McCain’s advocacy of open borders. Anyone who has been half awake knows McCain’s record is the exact opposite of what he proposes in his campaign literature.

Will McCain get away with such brazen hypocrisy again? Washington insiders are betting he will.

Yet, Republican voters in Arizona have been saying they’ve had enough. In fact, rank and file Arizona Republicans have been saying that for several years.

In McCain’s own backyard, something unprecedented in Arizona politics happened recently. In Arizona’s most populous county, Maricopa County Republicans passed a resolution of censureship against their own senior Republican senator, John McCain. Similar resolutions have since passed by Republican gatherings in other counties and at the state level.

Republicans everywhere remember McCain’s dishonest posturing to win reelection the last time he faced voters in 2010. McCain defused the illegal immigration issue by declaring, “OK, let’s build the danged fence!”

But it’s not just McCain’s dishonesty on illegal immigration that has Arizona Republicans ready to send him into retirement. McCain has played ball with liberal Democrats on several important issues.

Remember McCain-Feingold, the federal legislation curtailing citizens’ First Amendment rights to make campaign donations? Arizona Republicans do.

Remember Obama’s sellout to Iran in the nuclear arms deal? McCain helped facilitate that gift to Obama by opposing strong measures to require the US Senate to fulfill its constitutional obligation to approve the treaty.

Remember Common Core? McCain refused to help in the battle to rein in the federal Department of Education.

Remember McConnell’s cave-in to Obama on conservative Republican efforts to curtail the resettlement of Islamist-infiltrated immigration from Syria? McCain did not support those congressional efforts.

On a wide range of issues important to conservative Republicans and now incorporated in the 2016 national Platform of the Republican Party, patriots have found John McCain on the wrong side or refusing to join the battle.

So, how does McCain hold onto power when he has been censured by local party leaders in his own state? Who is supporting him if the rank and file Republicans have got his number? What happened to Tip O’Neill’s famous axiom, “all politics is local”? The answer is that the Republican establishment has “deep pockets” and no borders. McCain’s campaign is being financed mainly by out-of-state corporate and “Super PAC” money, not by Arizona Republicans.

Arizona is on the front line of the war over border control and immigration enforcement. The Arizona legislature has passed several courageous bills to gain control of its borders and inhibit employment of illegal aliens. On every single one of those state-level Republican legislative initiatives, John McCain was on the other side.

Arizona Republicans are now remembering McCain’s duplicity and hypocrisy. When they are asked on August 30, should we allow this cynical globalist politician to represent Arizona for another six years in the United States Senate, they should not say no. They should say, Hell no!