Establishment Republicans Choose Their Need for Approval Over the GOP Base on Amnesty for Illegals

I am been baffled by the mentality of pro-amnesty Republicans who, however many times they are shut down, repeatedly come back for more after a short interval. It is as if they are triggered by a Tourette’s tic that can only be suppressed momentarily before manifesting itself again.

On many issues, Republicans have either conceded or put their preferences on extended hold. Sadly, one must acknowledge that gay marriage, the flat tax, privatizing Social Security, and abolishing the Department of Education may fall into this category.

Yet there is a breed of Republican who can withdraw on those and other issues, but when it comes to amnesty for illegal aliens, they just cannot let it go.

What is the psychology behind this?

Amnesty Republicans typically suffer from two dark malign personality traits: an unsavory need for approval from elites and a desire for intimacy with the Chamber of Commerce. What else could explain forsaking a loving long-term relationship with the GOP base in favor of a Tinder date with the owner of a meat packing plant?

What psychologists call “Denialism” also seems to be at work.

Absent making categorical opposition to amnesty and illegal immigration the paramount issue in his first campaign, Donald J. Trump would not have gotten more than about 8 percent of the vote in the Iowa caucuses or New Hampshire primary. Without the Biden border debacle, he could not have risen from the political dead to win his second term.

Yet the amnesty Republicans are in denial about the enduring primacy of Trump’s signature issue. They seem to think that after they are swatted down on amnesty, they just need to wait a short time before beating the drum again.

It is as if the Trump phenomenon never happened or was a passing flight of fancy, and as soon as there is the slightest sign of a chink in Trump’s armor, it is time for amnesty again!

After Trump’s second victory, they piped down and shelved the issue, but as soon as the president’s approval ratings ticked down in 2026, they began again, led by Ohio Governor Mike DeWine and various Congressional representatives. Newt Gingrich and Sean Hannity would have never dared to advocate amnesty on morning of Wednesday, November 6, 2024, but in 2026 they slithered off down into the amnesty hole.

Similarly, after 911, a chastened Wall Street Journal editorial page, which had previously advocated a constitutional amendment providing that “there will be open borders,” quietly turned tail, but it only lasted for so long.

For example, editorial board member Dan Henniger recently gave a “Hit of the Week” on the Journal’s Fox show to the late Lindsey Graham for his efforts in the failed 2013 “Gang of Eight” amnesty gambit. With all that he could have cited as an epitaph for Graham, he came up with that?

The Journal also appears to be beset by the “sunk cost fallacy,” a cognitive condition suffered by an individual who has devoted so much effort to an unsuccessful endeavor or cause that he sinks more resources into it, even when logic would dictate otherwise. Coming from the most extreme end of the amnesty crowd, the Journal poured many years into outright “open borders” advocacy, so it cannot cut its losses.

Finally, amnesty Republicans usually harbor the belief that they will curry favor with recipients of amnesty and turn them into GOP voters, which would appear to be the product of either a manic episode per bipolar syndrome or delusions per schizophrenia.

In the poker game of politics, the Democrats would say, “I’ll match you amnesty and raise you all manner of transfer payments and entitlements.” Who do you think poor recent amnesty recipients will be voting for then?

I have covered Tourette’s syndrome, dependent personality disorder (the extreme need to please), denialism, sunk cost fallacy, bipolar disorder and schizophrenia as sources for the behavior of Republican officials who support amnesty — in its many forms, guises and euphemisms — for illegal aliens.

It is a witch’s brew of conditions, indeed.

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