{"id":2704213,"date":"2026-11-13T07:58:02","date_gmt":"2026-11-13T12:58:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaignthe-gop-midterm-loss-is-not-a-mandate-for-amnesty\/"},"modified":"2026-11-13T08:03:14","modified_gmt":"2026-11-13T13:03:14","slug":"utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaignthe-gop-midterm-loss-is-not-a-mandate-for-amnesty","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaignthe-gop-midterm-loss-is-not-a-mandate-for-amnesty\/","title":{"rendered":"The GOP Midterm Loss Is Not A Mandate For Amnesty"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">20<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Futm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaignthe-gop-midterm-loss-is-not-a-mandate-for-amnesty%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2704213&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>After Republicans\u2019 midterm losses,some in Washington blame Trump\u2019s immigration enforcement for Latino defections. The author says polling shows economics &#8211; especially inflation tied to the Iran war &#8211; drove voters, not deportations. He accuses the GOP establishment of pushing amnesty deals to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/blue-state-residents-asked-to-make-massive-sacrifice-for-border-crossers\/\" title=\"Blue state residents urged to make significant sacrifices for border crossers.\">secure cheap labor<\/a> for farms, hotels, and construction, citing bills and statements favoring legal status for certain undocumented workers. He argues leaders favor donors over voters, betraying promises, and should step aside rather than impose amnesty; the party must start honoring voter priorities.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>In the wake of Republicans\u2019 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/its-not-crazy-to-think-biden-sabotaged-nord-stream-to-deepen-us-involvement-in-the-ukraine-war\/\" title=\"It...s Not Crazy To Think Biden Sabotaged Nord Stream To Deepen US Involvement In The Ukraine War\">historic midterm wipeout<\/a>, there\u2019s a narrative push underway in Washington that it was Trump\u2019s immigration policy, especially ICE deportations, that drove Latino voters who voted for Trump in 2024 to vote Democrat this time around.<\/p>\n<p>This narrative is demonstrably false, but it\u2019s being pushed by Washington Republicans who want to return the GOP to its pre-Trump form once the president leaves office (which is a fantasy because the pre-Trump GOP is completely dead, never coming back). In the meantime, they\u2019d like to cut an immigration deal with Democrats to grant amnesty to illegal immigrants \u2014 specifically, to illegals who work in certain industries.<\/p>\n<p>They are of course denouncing the term \u201camnesty,\u201d as DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin did in a recent interview, even as Trump himself did in his <em>60 Minutes<\/em> interview with Ross Douthat. But what they describe \u2014 granting legal status to foreign nationals who came to the U.S. illegally and allowing them to remain and work here legally \u2014 is amnesty, plain and simple. <\/p>\n<p>What\u2019s really happening here is that the GOP establishment, the people who have always hated Trump\u2019s America First coalition and the MAGA agenda, are trying to ram through amnesty as a way to secure cheap foreign labor for favored industries before Democrats take over completely.<\/p>\n<p>First, consider the argument they\u2019re using to push amnesty. As my colleague Jordan Boyd <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2026\/11\/12\/no-latino-voters-swing-to-democrats-was-not-because-of-deportations\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">explains in these pages<\/a>, the idea that Latinos voted Democrat in the midterms because of Trump\u2019s immigration policy isn\u2019t backed up by polling data, which shows that economic issues, not immigration, drove Latino voters into the arms of Democrats. \u201cOne <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/politics\/2026-elections\/exit-polls\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">NBC exit poll<\/a> found that 45 percent of Latino voters said the economy was their biggest concern going into the 2026 election,\u201d wrote Boyd. \u201cOnly 15 percent reported \u2018immigration\u2019 as \u2018the most important facing the country.\u2019 Of those who prioritized immigration, six in 10 voted Republican.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The vast majority of Latino voters \u2014 94 percent \u2014 said cost of living was a crucial or major factor in their midterm vote. And as Boyd noted, exit polling showed that the more a Latino voter said that immigration was an important factor in how they voted, the more likely they were to vote Republican. Another Federalist colleague, Shawn Fleetwood, <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2026\/11\/05\/post-election-data-immigration-is-a-winning-issue-for-republicans\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">broke down exit polling data last week<\/a> that showed the same thing. In one CNN exit poll, 73 percent of respondents said Trump\u2019s immigration enforcement was a \u201ccrucial\u201d or a \u201cmajor factor\u201d to their vote. Republicans won this group 51 to 47 percent.<\/p>\n<p>For Latino voters, as for voters generally, the main concern was the economy \u2014 which was a concern precisely because gas and grocery prices spiked after Trump decided to attack Iran. It was <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2026\/11\/04\/the-nationwide-collapse-of-the-republican-party-is-trumps-fault\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">the unpopular and costly Iran war<\/a>, not ICE deportations, that turned voters away from the GOP (along with a host of lesser issues like corruption and lack of transparency around the Epstein files).<\/p>\n<p>The Washington Republicans who blame the midterms on immigration of course have little to say about the Iran war. When they say anything at all, it\u2019s to claim that the real problem is Trump didn\u2019t go after Iran hard enough, that Vice President J.D. Vance tried to negotiate an end to it, that we didn\u2019t pursue an insane policy of arming the Kurds or invading with ground troops. They will say almost anything, however untethered from reality, before they admit that the war was a terrible idea to begin with and we never should have done it.<\/p>\n<p>And now they\u2019re saying that what the American people <em>really<\/em> want is for Republicans to strike an immigration deal with Democrats and grant some form of amnesty to entire classes of illegal aliens. This week on Fox News, Rep. Marlin Stutzman of Indiana, a Freedom Caucus Republican, <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/RepStutzman\/status\/2120664532624318866?a=Z5oSKgQ4TiZhnAQ1iJ0&#038;s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">argued for a Republican immigration<\/a> reform that includes amnesty for certain illegal aliens and no mass deportations.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhat\u2019s happened is first President Trump did what he said he was going to do by securing the border. That was step number one, that\u2019s happened. And now we need to look at our laws,\u201d he said. \u201cI think we should be focusing on those who are here that haven\u2019t broken criminal laws, that are working, that could be paying taxes, they would be willing to be sponsored by somebody. There\u2019s room for that, I believe, and that\u2019s what people are looking for.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Stutzman went on to denounce the idea of mass deportations, which Trump campaigned on successfully in 2024. \u201cI just don\u2019t think it\u2019s possible,\u201d he said. \u201cYou\u2019re looking at 20 million people that you would have to deport out of this country.\u201d Never mind that Trump explicitly promised 15-20 million deportations during his 2024 campaign, even vowing to use the military to accomplish it. That was a popular message.<\/p>\n<p>Unfortunately, Trump himself is now talking about an immigration deal for \u201cthe good ones,\u201d as he calls them, immigrants who came illegally but are now working in certain industries. Indeed, there seems to be a broad agreement among GOP officeholders that illegal immigrants who <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/u-s-and-canada-reject-chinese-sanctions-over-slave-labor-debate\/\" title=\"U.S. and Canada reject Chinese sanctions over slave labor debate\">provide cheap labor<\/a> for farms, hotels, and construction companies should be exempt from U.S. immigration laws.<\/p>\n<p>For example the GOP-backed farm bill, filed back in June, would allow illegal immigrants working in a variety of agricultural-related industries to <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/ScottMechkowski\/status\/2120531997374202342?a=t8Gj3V_xLsJZ2A3DgKA&#038;s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">obtain H-2A visas and avoid deportation<\/a>. The bill, H.R. 9535, called the \u201cSecuring Agriculture\u2019s Workforce Act,\u201d is sponsored by House Agriculture Chairman Glenn Thompson, a Republican, and has a total of 52 Republican cosponsors. It basically <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/scottmechkowski\/status\/2121015187629044058\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">creates a permanent underclass of foreign agricultural workers<\/a> who will be issued H-2A visas and be employable on a permanent year-round basis. Whatever the Trump 2024 coalition voted for, it wasn\u2019t that.<\/p>\n<p>Time and again, Republicans pay lip service to immigration enforcement but advance policies that ensure big business has access to cheap foreign labor. They don\u2019t really care what their voters want, they care what their donors want. That\u2019s why Sen. John Thune was just reelected majority leader by Senate Republicans after an historic midterm wipeout. Voters spoke, they said they were angry with the GOP, they handed control of the Senate to Democrats, and effectively destroyed the Republican Party for a generation. The message was clear. Republican senators responded by saying, we don\u2019t care.<\/p>\n<p>They\u2019re saying the same thing about immigration. Voters support mass deportations, they support ICE enforcement, they support Trump immigration policy. And in response, Washington Republicans are falsely claiming that immigration was a major cause of the midterm route, and then using that as a pretext to do what they wanted to do all along: pass amnesty for their friends and donors in big business.<\/p>\n<p>Doing this is worse than doing nothing. Much worse. After a defeat this thorough, the establishment Republicans should resign in shame, not try to cram amnesty down our throats on their way out the door. As <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/Peoples_Pundit\/status\/2121029050067988857?a=qhTsFLddzpfOvXWWRyc&#038;s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">pollster Rich Baris said<\/a>, \u201cPut simply, the best thing people who betrayed voters and cost the party their trust can do, is go away.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>That they refuse to go away is a blatant slap in the face to GOP voters. Whatever comes after these people, it has to be a party that actually cares about what voters want and does what they promise to do. Until Republicans figure that out, they will remain in the wilderness where they belong.<\/p>\n<hr>\n<p>      John Daniel Davidson is a senior editor at The Federalist. His writing has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, the Claremont Review of Books, The New York Post, and elsewhere. He is the author of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Pagan-America-Decline-Christianity-Dark\/dp\/1684514444\/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=Pagan+America&#038;qid=1695306441&#038;sr=8-1\"><i>Pagan America: the Decline of Christianity and the Dark Age to Come<\/i><\/a>. Follow him on Twitter, @johnddavidson.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>GOP blames immigration for losses; false seeks amnesty<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":518,"featured_media":2704214,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/Thune.png","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[3712,6203,3813,7427],"class_list":["post-2704213","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-amnesty","tag-gop","tag-immigration","tag-midterm"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/Thune.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2704213","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/518"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2704213"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2704213\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2704217,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2704213\/revisions\/2704217"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2704214"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2704213"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2704213"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2704213"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}