WASHINGTON – Liberal talk-show host Chris Matthews has candidly admitted what Democrats steadfastly refuse to acknowledge: They favor immigration amnesty because it could help them win elections.

While interviewing former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani on MSNBC on Monday, Matthews said, "the Democrats want votes, let's face it."

In a fast-paced exchange with Giuliani, Matthews rattled off comments in quick-succession, while the mayor tried to interject.

"Would you trust either party to enforce the laws on illegal hiring? Would you trust either party to enforce that law? Either party? They want cheap labor. And the Democrats want votes, let's face it," Matthews said.

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When President Obama announced in November his executive action to give 5 million illegal immigrants amnesty, he said it was so they could "come out of the shadows and get right with the law."

Matthews was clearly referring to illegal immigrants when he said "Democrats want votes," because he had just prefaced that remark by observing neither Democrats nor Republicans want to crack down on the hiring of illegal immigrants.

WND has reported in depth how Democrats are using legal and illegal immigration to gains votes by moving the country to the left.

Politics of countries of origin

According to researchers, today's immigrants largely come from countries with systems of government much more rooted in social-welfare philosophy than America.

"Basically, they like big government. They like Obamacare, gun control, they like rich paying more taxes, more environmental regulations. As citizens, they generally vote for the party with that orientation," explained Steve Camarota of the Center for Immigration studies, or CIS.

That's backed up by a comprehensive study by Phyllis Schlafly's Eagle Forum, based on a compilation of census data and surveys including the Pew Research Center, the Pew Hispanic Center, Gallup, NBC News, Harris polling, the Annenberg Policy Center, Latino Decisions, the Center for Immigration Studies and the Hudson Institute.

The Eagle Forum's survey found "most immigrants come from countries where the government plays a larger role in the economy and society."

"Their support for expansive government is reinforced by liberal elites in immigrant communities and the liberal urban areas in which so many settle."

According to the study, 71 percent of voting-age Hispanics and 9 percent of voting-age Asians were either foreign born or had at least one foreign-born parent, and the data showed those voters skewed heavily to the left.

For instance, the Pew Research Center "has found that 55 percent of Hispanics have a negative view of capitalism, the highest of any group surveyed."

"Pew also found that 75 percent of Hispanics prefer a bigger government providing more services, as do 55 percent of Asian-Americans. This compares to just 41 percent of the general public," the report said.

"While the general public was divided in 2012 on Obamacare, 66 percent of Hispanics support it; and three times as many Asian Americans had a favorable opinion of the program as had an unfavorable opinion of it."

Additionally, contrary to assertions by many Republican politicians who favor amnesty, the research showed most immigrants were not socially conservative.

For example, U.S.-born Hispanics and Asians tended to support abortion and gay rights, while foreign-born Hispanics and Asians were divided.

The study concluded that "more importantly, polls show that immigrants and their children do not vote for candidates based on social issues."

"Polls indicate that Republicans’ social conservatism does not particularly help or hurt them with voters in immigrant communities."

The survey also found Hispanics and Asians were not alone in their liberalism, as the data for other immigrants, including Europeans and Muslims, indicated they also had views to the left of the average American voter.

The same pattern was discovered in all Western democracies, with immigrants and their adult children strongly favoring leftist parties.

Immigration moving country leftward



The Eagle Forum study's key conclusion is that immigration is changing the country's politics by moving the electorate to the left.

"Because immigrants and their adult children overwhelmingly favor big government, there is no issue more important for conservatives than reducing the future number of legal immigrants allowed into the country each year. Otherwise, legal immigration will continue to add millions of liberal voters every decade, making it extremely unlikely that conservatives will be successful on all the issues they care about."

With Hispanics and Asians now accounting for the bulk of immigrants, their views on the role of government have become increasingly relevant.

Their striking preference for big government was illustrated in this graph, included in the Eagle Forum report:

Camarota told WND another reason why immigration is such a boon to the Democrats is that it transforms society in ways that makes their arguments heard all the more sympathetically.

One obvious factor is that mass immigration from poor countries significantly increases the number of poor in America, and the poor tend to vote Democratic.

"One third of all the children in poverty today are in immigrant families. So, you have a much larger low-income population, especially children," noted Camorata.

That leads to liberal arguments for greater government programs that even independents and moderates might find appealing.

"People naturally say, 'Well, we've got to do something about it; those families obviously need help.'"

Camorata noted that as mass immigration dramatically increased the number of low-income workers, there was more pressure to expand specific government programs.

"People say, 'We gotta help them. Let's increase the value of the earned income tax credit. Make sure all their kids can get Medicaid.' That's exactly the way its played out politically over the last 25 years all these low-income workers with kids. 'Let's expand Head Start, let's have universal pre-K, let's make sure everyone can get WIC and SNAP (the programs that replaced food stamps), Medicaid, those kinds of things."

Camorata maintained that the need for government assistance is one reason that even the immigrants who may have socially conservative views do not vote conservative.

He cited the examples of New York and San Francisco, "probably two of the most heavily immigrant-settled places in the country and they vote overwhelmingly for the Democratic Party. They (immigrants) can be opposed to everything from handing out condoms to gay marriage to subsidized abortion and it doesn't bother them (to vote for Democrats.)"

"They can be enthusiastic Democrats right alongside the most extreme elements of the liberal social agenda of the Democratic Party. So, what they're telling us is, these are issues they generally don't care about or agree with" and that socially conservative issues do not really resonate with immigrants.

Camorata believes Republicans compound the problem by convincing themselves otherwise.

Even though many conservatives believe, based on the weight of their arguments, they can persuade immigrants to move to the right, Camorata said experience suggests otherwise.

"People who leave New York state because of its oppressive regulations and so forth, when they get to North Carolina, they vote for those same policies."

Camarota does believe voters in the rest of the electorate could be persuaded that legal immigration is a severe problem.

"If Republicans were to explain why it's problematic for taxpayers, why it's making the country so much more densely populated and how that impacts their standard of living, what it means for American workers, there's no question the public would respond."

He insisted he Republicans could use the explosion of immigration issue against the Democrats.

"But rather than persuading people it will lead to a more liberal agenda, they choose instead to please the electorate."

Additionally, he notes, the time to make that argument is running short, because the legal immigration population is three times bigger than illegal immigrants, and a good portion of them vote.

And soon, he predicts, so will those who are currently illegal immigrants.

Democrats using immigration to increase power

The Eagle Forum study succinctly concludes that Democrats understand immigration is an electoral bonanza for liberalism.

While finding most Republicans reluctant to directly address the partisan implications of mass immigration, "Democrats have been quite open about how much immigration is improving their ability to win elections by importing massive numbers of liberal voters."

The report cites Eliseo Medina, a top official with both the Service Employees International Union and Democratic Socialists of America, as explaining how the expansion of the Democrat electorate through immigration "will solidify and expand the progressive coalition for the future."

Even though the study claims mass immigration tends to harm those the Democratic Party traditionally has claimed to want to help, such as less-educated workers and minorities, "immigrants’ liberalism often reflects self-interest, as many benefit from affirmative action and welfare."

Camorata illustrated that with the real-world example of the health-care debate.

"What was one of the chief justifications for Obamacare? Thirty-five million people without health insurance, and that number's up 15 million since 1990. See what I mean? It's really, really helpful to have all those low-income people, all those uninsured people, when you want to make an argument for more expansive government. And, the beauty of it is, you also increase the number of voters who are sympathetic to that argument."

He described how the government uses the Current Population Survey primarily to get data on who doesn't have health insurance, and the survey asks whether a person is an immigrant and when he or she came to America.

Camorota said that makes it very easy to calculate the impact of immigrants and their children on the total uninsured population. And for the last decade-and-a-half, two-thirds to three-quarters of the growth of the uninsured has been immigrants and their children.

"It is perfectly accurate to say that the nation's health insurance crisis is being directly driven by its immigration policy."

When did Democrats realize mass immigration was a leftist boon that could be exploited at the polls?

"By the 1980s, people in the Democratic Party realized what was happening. Prior to that, they weren't sure how the immigrants were going to vote. But then I think they realized these were people who largely were in need of public services."

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